Jim Jones Talks FDA Plans for Sodium, ‘Healthy’ and Front-Pack Labeling
Another step in voluntary sodium reduction. What foods are eligible for the term “healthy”? What will be on the front nutritional labels of foods at the end of this year?
Those appear to be on the immediate horizon of the FDA – as well as some response to the increasing number of states that are banning certain food additives – according to Jim Jones, who in August 2023 was named the first Deputy Commissioner of the FDA’s Human Foods Program. He was the keynote address Tuesday (July 16) at the Institute of Food Technologists’ annual meeting and expo.
Regarding the state bans, it sounds like he wants the FDA to catch up and eventually take the lead. “I have some experience on this when I was with the EPA. States started banning certain chemicals [and eventually EPA responded]. Will we get the resources to be ambitious enough to take the lead?”
California is in the lead for now and has passed and signed a law, effective Jan. 1, 2027, that would ban brominated vegetable oil, potassium bromate, propylparaben and red dye 3. Titanium dioxide could be added.
Those same ingredients are in laws or legislative bills in Illinois, Indiana, New York and Pennsylvania, and some of those states have added new ones – like high-fructose corn syrup in Indiana, azodicarbonamide in New York and yellow 5 & 6 and butylated hydroxyanisole in Pennsylvania. Other states are considering bans.
Check this list: Do you use any of these 28 chemicals that may be banned by states or the feds?
If all get enacted, the result would be a patchwork of different state regulations that could stymie any national food or beverage processor.
“I’m definitely concerned about it,” Jones said at the IFT meeting. “I’ve heard many recommendations, but none will work.” But he did indicate the agency would like to get ahead of this issue – as it did in at the start of this month when it revoked the authorization for brominated vegetable oil as a food additive. “You’ll see a couple more [additives that lose authorization] in the coming months,” he promised.
Jones said he was proud of the food industry’s response to a voluntary call for sodium reduction, issued in 2021, which has resulted in a 12% reduction in sodium across 154 categories. “So we will issue a second goal for more sodium reduction in the coming weeks.”
And the FDA has promised to tackle two long-debated and thorny consumer issues: what makes a food “healthy” and front-of-package nutrition labeling, which is in use in other countries. He indicated there would be guidance on both this fall.
