Policy Statement & Submission

7 November 2007


Mr Frederick Ma, JP
Secretary for Commerce and Economic Development
Commerce and Economic Development Bureau
8/F, West Wing, Central Government Offices
Ice House Street, Central
Hong Kong


Dear Fred,

Legislation on Nutrition Labelling

We note that the Chief Executive has stated in the Policy Address that an Amendment Bill will be introduced to the Legislative Council early next year. Given that short time span, it is important to ensure that the right approach in law-making is being taken, hence we would like to reflect the Chamber's views as follows.

We fully support the protection and promotion of public health – it is an important part of sustainable development which the Chamber champions; hence we do not oppose a legislative approach to nutrition labeling. In considering the government's proposals, our starting point is that an effective regime is not achieved by over-regulation, but rather, there should be a combination of light-handed regulation, business-friendly compliance, and effective public education. We have some concerns that the present proposals may not achieve that.

In the broad sense, our main concern is with the apparent attitude of “the more stringent, the better”, both in the design and the implementation of the legislation. For instance, when the proposals were drawn up in 2005, the government seemed to have gone to the extreme in proposing the number of core nutrients, although the government has since revised that in favour of a more moderate scheme (reducing from nine nutrients to six). While that is welcomed, it remains the requirement that products that are fully compliant with nutrition labelling requirements in other jurisdictions, e.g. the US and the EU, have to be relabelled. Such an application of the law is, in our view, too mechanical and unnecessary. It will have adverse impacts on traders (both exporters and importers) of food products. More importantly, some exporters may simply stop supplying the products to Hong Kong, a small market by any global standards. This defeats the purpose of safeguarding consumer welfare, as the consumer will have less choice to products which hitherto have complied with recognised international standards of regulation.

While this is no doubt primarily a public health matter, there are real impacts on commerce and on development of some key industries of Hong Kong, given Hong Kong's important place in the global supply chain. The impact of the new regulation on Hong Kong's competitiveness in the logistics industry and in the supply chain services sectors will thus need to be further examined, over and above the impact on the trading sector and the consumer market.

The Chamber would therefore call for further moderation in the design of the legislation, and greater flexibility in its implementation. The practitioners have proposed a claims-based rather than mandatory labelling scheme, a more flexible approach to content expressing so as to avoid the need for re-labelling, and exemptions for small volumes and small businesses. We urge the Administration to give due weight to these considerations in taking the legislative proposals forward.

Yours sincerely,




Lily Chiang
Chairman






7 November 2007


Dr York Chow, SBS, JP
Secretary for Food and Health
Food and Health Bureau
19/F, Murray Building
Garden Road, Central
Hong Kong


Dear York,

Legislation on Nutrition Labelling

We note that the Chief Executive has stated in the Policy Address that an Amendment Bill will be introduced to the Legislative Council early next year. Given that short time span, it is important to ensure that the right approach in law-making is being taken, hence we would like to reflect the Chamber's views as follows.

We fully support the protection and promotion of public health – it is an important part of sustainable development which the Chamber champions; hence we do not oppose a legislative approach to nutrition labeling. In considering the government's proposals, our starting point is that an effective regime is not achieved by over-regulation, but rather, there should be a combination of light-handed regulation, business-friendly compliance, and effective public education. We have some concerns that the present proposals may not achieve that.

In the broad sense, our main concern is with the apparent attitude of “the more stringent, the better”, both in the design and the implementation of the legislation. For instance, when the proposals were drawn up in 2005, the government seemed to have gone to the extreme in proposing the number of core nutrients, although the government has since revised that in favour of a more moderate scheme (reducing from nine nutrients to six). While that is welcomed, it remains the requirement that products that are fully compliant with nutrition labelling requirements in other jurisdictions, e.g. the US and the EU, have to be relabelled. Such an application of the law is, in our view, too mechanical and unnecessary. It will have adverse impacts on traders (both exporters and importers) of food products. More importantly, some exporters may simply stop supplying the products to Hong Kong, a small market by any global standards. This defeats the purpose of safeguarding consumer welfare, as the consumer will have less choice to products which hitherto have complied with recognised international standards of regulation.

While this is no doubt primarily a public health matter, there are real impacts on commerce and on development of some key industries of Hong Kong, given Hong Kong's important place in the global supply chain. The impact of the new regulation on Hong Kong's competitiveness in the logistics industry and in the supply chain services sectors will thus need to be further examined, over and above the impact on the trading sector and the consumer market.

The Chamber would therefore call for further moderation in the design of the legislation, and greater flexibility in its implementation. The practitioners have proposed a claims-based rather than mandatory labelling scheme, a more flexible approach to content expressing so as to avoid the need for re-labelling, and exemptions for small volumes and small businesses. We urge the Administration to give due weight to these considerations in taking the legislative proposals forward.

Yours sincerely,




Lily Chiang
Chairman