Public Consultation: Industrially-produced trans fats in processed foods - EXTENDED

Overview

Consultation period extended until 29 September 2023. 

In August 2019 the Australia and New Zealand Ministerial Forum on Food Regulation (now the Food Ministers’ Meeting) asked the Food Regulation Standing Committee to consider options to improve the composition of the food supply in relation to trans fats. 

This consultation has been prepared by the Food Regulation Standing Committee (FRSC) to support consideration of regulatory and non-regulatory options for improving the composition of the food supply in relation to industrially-produced trans fats.

The desired outcome of this work is to ensure industrially-produced trans fats are eliminated or reduced as much as possible from the food supply in Australia and New Zealand to support all population groups to minimise consumption of trans fats.  

FRSC has proposed three policy options (in addition to the status quo) to achieve the desired outcome. These policy options are not necessarily mutually exclusive and more than one option could be adopted.

The options are:

• Voluntary reformulation
• Regulatory limits for industrial trans fats in processed foods
• Prohibiting use of partially-hydrogenated oils in processed foods

Further information about these options is detailed in the Public Consultation Regulation Impact Statement which is available to download from the 'Related' section below.

Why your views matter

Australia and New Zealand share a joint system for food labelling which is overseen by Food Ministers. Food Ministers are responsible for developing food regulation policy in the form of policy guidelines and to ensure stakeholder views are considered on appropriate policies. 

Stakeholder submissions to this consultation will be used by FRSC to identify a preferred policy option to recommend to the Food Ministers’ Meeting regarding potential changes to the food supply in relation industrially-produced trans fats.

Responding to the consultation

1. Download and read the Public Consultation Regulation Impact Statement (available under the ‘Related’ section at the bottom of this page).
2. Respond to the questions in the online survey – the questions in the survey match the questions in the Public Consultation Regulation Impact Statement. A preview of the survey is available for download under the ‘Related’ section at the bottom of this page.
3. Please provide evidence or examples to support your comments where possible. Comments on technical issues should be based on scientific evidence and/or supported by research where appropriate. Where possible, please provide citations to published studies or other sources.
4. It is not necessary to provide a response to all questions.
5. All submissions are subject to the Freedom of Information Act 1982 in Australia and the Official Information Act 1982 in New Zealand. If you consider that all or part of your submission should not be released, please make this clear when making your submission and indicate the grounds for withholding the information.

What happens next

Depending on the volume and complexity of submissions received, it is expected that the Decision Regulation Impact Statement with a preferred policy option and implementation mechanism will be presented to the Food Ministers in early 2024.

Depending on the Food Ministers’ decision, industry or government (depending on the implementation mechanism) would then undertake to introduce the preferred policy option(s) (if it is not to maintain the status quo).