China’s State Council released draft regulations on health food supervision and management in early June 2009.
If passed, the new regulations will assign responsibilty for supervising and managing the sector to the State Food and Drug Administration (SFDA).
This responsibility is currently shared across several different government agencies.
The proposed regulations aim to enforce stricter monitoring for the health food industry and to assure a higher level of food safety for the consumers.
Specific details about how the regulations will affect production and sales is expected to be announced in the near future.
As part of the enforcement underway, the SFDA has started to streamline the registration process and re-issue certificates for all health food products.
For products that were already registered with Ministry of Health (MOH) and SFDA, and those with certificates granted before 30 June 2009, the SFDA requires companies to submit the 'Basic Information Form for Health Food Products' document for background checks and verification.
NZTE is able to help New Zealand health food exporters establish direct business contacts with the Chinese importers/distributors and keep you updated with the regulations.
More information:
SFDA:
www.sfda.gov.cn
(English section: eng.sfda.gov.cn/eng/)
