Renewed NAFTA gives governments a free path to legislate on food labeling
30 octubre 2018

NUTRITION

Labeling. On September 30th, the United States, Mexico and Canada agreed to renew the free trade agreement that unites the countries of North America. The new treaty, known as USMCA (United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement), removes the restriction for these nations to impose unilateral frontal food labeling regulations, giving governments the power to legislate on the matter. To enter into force, the agreement must be signed and ratified by congresses of the three member countries. The legislative study in Mexico is expected to begin in November 2018 and Canada is expected to ratify it by the middle of next year. The last country to seal the agreement at the legislative level would be the United States, which would ratify it in the course of next year.

With regard to the food sector, the final version of the USMCA favoured the removal of the annex that stipulated the prohibition for signatory countries to implement front-of-package labeling systems on food products and beverages. This means that once the USMCA comes into force, each government will have the freedom to legislate without any restrictions stipulated by this tripartite agreement.

After constant pressure from NGOs throughout the region, the delegations of the three countries finally decided not to include the U.S.-led proposal, which sought to avoid the use of any symbol denoting harm caused by the consumption of non-alcoholic foods or beverages, and thus limit the ability of the signatory countries’ governments to implement their own labeling systems.

Next steps

To finally enter into force, the USMCA must be first ratified by the respective local legislatures of the three member countries, which must accept the trade terms agreed upon by the delegations. Mexico intends to sign the agreement before the presidential replacement December 1st of this year, and Canada will surely be incorporated quickly thanks to its simple ratification procedure; the United States will wait until 2019 to do so in view of the fact that there will be a change in the composition of its Congress as a result of the legislative elections that will take place November 6th. The USMCA is estimated to enter into force in the second half of 2019 or the first half of 2020.  

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