Question to the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs:

To ask the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, what steps she is taking to facilitate the development of an improved labelling code in the UK.

The Food Information Regulations (No. 1855) were introduced in 2014 and has resulted in better and more consistent labelling of food in a number of areas, including allergen labelling, ingredients labelling and, from the end of this year, nutrition labelling.

Origin labelling is also improved by these Regulations with new rules on origin labelling of meat of poultry, sheep, goat and pigs introduced in April last year. In addition, we look forward to prospective implementing acts on origin labelling of ingredients of foods, including meat and dairy, where this is different from the place that the food itself was made. The Government is fully engaged in these discussions and expects them to result in improved labelling of meat and dairy products in due course.

We have been pressing for mandatory origin labelling on dairy products, in particular lightly processed dairy products such as butter, cheese and cream but have met with some resistance from the European Commission. We will continue to press for these improvements.

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