Mandatory Genetically Modified Labeling for Food Exported to Taiwan

According to the June 2016 session of the Technical Barriers to Trade Committee (TBT Committee), countries including Canada expressed deep concerns about trade restrictions, which included technical measures of other members, specifically Taiwan's regulations on labeling food and food additives containing genetically modified organisms (GMOs). The countries argued that the regulation was excessively stringent beyond necessity and that Taiwan could potentially implement a less restrictive measure.

According to the Draft, the limit of GMO content in three groups of food—prepackaged food, food additives, and unpackaged food—must be labeled as genetically modified if it is 3% or above. This GMO threshold set by Taiwan is assessed to be excessively stringent compared to other countries in the region.

Moreover, the mandatory labeling for the three product groups mentioned above is applied in two cases, including:

1. Food (packaged/unpackaged), food additives produced from GMOs;
2. Food (packaged/unpackaged), food additives directly used from GMOs in the production process, even if the final product does not contain genetically modified DNA fragments or genetically modified proteins.

In preparation for the eventuality that Taiwan's Draft will come into effect, the Directorate for Standards, Metrology and Quality sent Official Dispatch No. 1508/TDC-TBT to several relevant agencies, which specifies:

- The Directorate for Standards, Metrology and Quality requests the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development (MARD) to study Taiwan’s regulations and provide other relevant information if available to prevent the impact of Taiwan's food and food additives labeling regulations containing GMOs on Vietnamese manufacturing and exporting enterprises. Additionally, the Directorate also requests MARD to develop certain technical measures for Vietnam following Taiwan's regulations to restrict low-quality goods and protect the health of domestic consumers;

- Furthermore, the Official Dispatch was also sent to the Northern Food Corporation, Southern Food Corporation, and the Vietnam Chamber of Commerce and Industry (VCCI). The Directorate requests the competent authorities to disseminate the regulations to related Vietnamese food and food additives exporting enterprises;

Read the full content of the official dispatch here.

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