Food labelling when it comes to "beliefs"

duploelabs

cormie wrote: »

Thanks for that! I think the problem with dairy in particular, is that a lot of people may assume, with the word vegan, although not in any legislation, that a product wouldn't contain dairy. So even if a non vegan who had a dairy allergy, was to consume something advertised/labelled as vegan, when milk was a main ingredient, it's not that it's going against any ethical stance, but rather the fact it misled and confused the person into assuming based on that label, that there was no dairy in it (Imagine if they were ok with trace amounts but not for it to be one of the main ingredients).

I'm guessing with a non common allergy ingredient like honey, there's not as much to worry about from a repercussion point of view.

The dessert you mention would I'm sure be ok to label as vegan. Vegan doesn't mean, nor has it ever meant perfection and a way of living that results in NO harm to life:

"Veganism is a way of living which seeks to exclude, as far as is possible and practicable, all forms of exploitation of, and cruelty to, animals for food, clothing or any other purpose."




I'm guessing this is to get one of the approved trademark labels, such as that of the vegan society on the packaging?

Again, this is a b*ll**** topic for this forum and again you do not read the points provided.

Allergens are listed on products because they can cause harm to the consumer, vegan products cannot be enforced legislatively as the criteria involved are far too wide ranging to execute for the legislators, far too troublesome for producers to enact, and far too confusing for the consumer.
Allergens are listed on packaging as they are quantifiable, 'discoverable', and enforceable should an incident take place and the consumer is injured from eating it only to discover there was an infringement.

I'm also guessing you're not based here considering you're quoting american bodies and not the ones based here.

cormie

I'm reading everything and have taken the information provided on board. I've also posed a scenario which has an uncertain outcome based on what's been posted so far. If it's uncertain what would happen in the scenario depicted, that's ok. I don't know what would happen either.

Again, it was simply a question of what would happen where both the allergy dairy was listed as a main ingredient and vegan was also stated on the packet. As in, does the term hold such little weight in law and legislation, that anyone can use it no matter what the ingredients are, without any fear of legal repercussion.

If say, Kosher, is in the same boat as vegan, without legal definition (again, I don't if this is the case - maybe it does have legal definition) and is portraying suitability for a belief, could any meat producer, stick Kosher on a packet, even though it doesn't meet the standards of that belief?


I'm based in Ireland, I did a quick google and got that price. I checked the vegan society and there's no pricing displayed.

pedroeibar1

Duplo as usual has given the correct ‘labelling’ answer.

Cormie, for openers your definition of veganism earlier in the thread is not generally accepted by a majority of vegans today. Is your interest in labeling due to a wish to make money out of it? It would be hard to do so on a large scale if you become an honest participant in that sector's production chain.

Take the latest ‘cult trend’ of vegan wine as an example. After fermentation wine is cloudy and remains in that state until it is clarified by age or an agent. The former takes a lot of a long time, only for the best wine, the latter until recently used an animal product for mass-market wines. That was either a product from dried blood (banned 1990’s?) by EU or using albumen i.e. egg-white which, when swirled in the liquid, gathers the particles and clarifies it. Cooks do the same to clarify stock. Even though that is removed, vegans still won’t accept wine using the last method, so a non-animal linked product is used. The wine is not any more special, possibly worse and costs considerably more. Vegans have gone one step further and now won’t buy wine where animal labour has been involved in the making process. Case in point – Chateau Latour, one of the handful of top wines in the world since the mid 1800’s. To prevent the ground being compacted and roots damaged between the vine rows by heavy machinery they instead use horse drawn equipment for ploughing, etc.. Use of horses does not meet the vegan standard (on animal cruelty), not that the Rothschilds are worried, given the huge demand and high price that wine commands! Even use of animal manure on a crop rules out acceptability for strict vegans.

Other than in religion, veganism in recent decades has been a fad particularly in the adolescent female sector (who have little money) and activists. It is a growing ‘trendy’ movement – particularly in the UK - that many believe has been kidnapped by those with agendas ranging through extremist animal rights activists, nutrition charlatans, nutters, petty criminals and even the Mafia.

In mainland Europe, particularly Italy, almost half of the many vegetables labelled ‘organic’ are not; most of the Italian olive oil labelled ‘extra virgin’ is doctored by cheap imported crap. Look at the scams surrounding miluka honey. Vegan labels or stamps will be the very same. I would not touch the sector with a bargepole, far too many cranks in it and life is much too short to deal with their vehemence. Even if they have a try-on law suit that they cannot win (edit), they are the type that will take it just for the PR and embroil you in a huge waste of time.

Pedro
(Who shoots, fishes and loves his veggies too.)

gozunda

duploelabs wrote: »

Again, this is a b*ll**** topic for this forum and again you do not read the points provided.

Allergens are listed on products because they can cause harm to the consumer, vegan products cannot be enforced legislatively as the criteria involved are far too wide ranging to execute for the legislators, far too troublesome for producers to enact, and far too confusing for the consumer.
Allergens are listed on packaging as they are quantifiable, 'discoverable', and enforceable should an incident take place and the consumer is injured from eating it only to discover there was an infringement.

I'm also guessing you're not based here considering you're quoting american bodies and not the ones based here.

It curious - but in many similar comments many of the sources posted from are freqently US based. The hugely litigious culture there coupled with very large food processing corporations means that potentially there's large amounts of money to be made from such scenarios. Statements that potentially 'food producers could find themselves in trouble' coupled with references of court cases etc makes me believe that there are some who would only be too happy to see similar here.

pedroeibar1

gozunda wrote: »

It curious - but in many similar comments many of the sources posted from are freqently US based. The hugely litigious culture there coupled with very large food processing corporations means that potentially there's large amounts of money to be made from such scenarios. Statements that potentially 'food producers could find themselves in trouble' coupled with references of court cases etc makes me believe that there are some who would only be too happy to see similar here.

The real problem is policing. There is very little, and when it is successfully used the miscreants walk free. That is the case in Italy and even in holy Ireland - look at our horsemeat/burger case, the pork feed scandal and a chicken relabeling scam. In the seafood sector Irish mussels that were known to be toxic were exported and destroyed that industry for several years. Many of these (pork & chicken) happened in Ballybay, and involved some of the same people. One family had been involved in a multi-million pork fraud in the 1980's - and walked free then also.

duploelabs

cormie wrote: »

Again, it was simply a question of what would happen where both the allergy dairy was listed as a main ingredient and vegan was also stated on the packet.

Again this hypothetical question is absolute steaming h*rsesh!t
Who on earth would be that stupid to invest thousands upon thousands euro on packaging design and printing to contradict themselves so blatantly? Can you cite examples? No i didn't think so

duploelabs

pedroeibar1 wrote: »

Duplo as usual has given the correct ‘labelling’ answer.

Cormie, for openers your definition of veganism earlier in the thread is not generally accepted by a majority of vegans today. Is your interest in labeling due to a wish to make money out of it? It would be hard to do so on a large scale if you become an honest participant in that sector's production chain.

Take the latest ‘cult trend’ of vegan wine as an example. After fermentation wine is cloudy and remains in that state until it is clarified by age or an agent. The former takes a lot of a long time, only for the best wine, the latter until recently used an animal product for mass-market wines. That was either a product from dried blood (banned 1990’s?) by EU or using albumen i.e. egg-white which, when swirled in the liquid, gathers the particles and clarifies it. Cooks do the same to clarify stock. Even though that is removed, vegans still won’t accept wine using the last method, so a non-animal linked product is used. The wine is not any more special, possibly worse and costs considerably more. Vegans have gone one step further and now won’t buy wine where animal labour has been involved in the making process. Case in point – Chateau Latour, one of the handful of top wines in the world since the mid 1800’s. To prevent the ground being compacted and roots damaged between the vine rows by heavy machinery they instead use horse drawn equipment for ploughing, etc.. Use of horses does not meet the vegan standard (on animal cruelty), not that the Rothschilds are worried, given the huge demand and high price that wine commands! Even use of animal manure on a crop rules out acceptability for strict vegans.

Other than in religion, veganism in recent decades has been a fad particularly in the adolescent female sector (who have little money) and activists. It is a growing ‘trendy’ movement – particularly in the UK - that many believe has been kidnapped by those with agendas ranging through extremist animal rights activists, nutrition charlatans, nutters, petty criminals and even the Mafia.

In mainland Europe, particularly Italy, almost half of the many vegetables labelled ‘organic’ are not; most of the Italian olive oil labelled ‘extra virgin’ is doctored by cheap imported crap. Look at the scams surrounding miluka honey. Vegan labels or stamps will be the very same. I would not touch the sector with a bargepole, far too many cranks in it and life is much too short to deal with their vehemence. Even if they have a try-on law suit that they cannot win (edit), they are the type that will take it just for the PR and embroil you in a huge waste of time.

Pedro
(Who shoots, fishes and loves his veggies too.)

Dried blood banned??
The majority of black pudding uses dried, and I believe you've to have very special dispensation to use fresh

gozunda

pedroeibar1 wrote: »

The real problem is policing. There is very little, and when it is successfully used the miscreants walk free. That is the case in Italy and even in holy Ireland - look at our horsemeat/burger case, the pork feed scandal and a chicken relabeling scam. In the seafood sector Irish mussels that were known to be toxic were exported and destroyed that industry for several years. Many of these (pork & chicken) happened in Ballybay, and involved some of the same people. One family had been involved in a multi-million pork fraud in the 1980's - and walked free then also.

As to your points - I would agree. Though these issues are fairly widespread globably. If I remember correctly the Ballybay case concerned Northern Ireland and cross border jurisdictions. Its not just meat products either - there have serious of cases of salad products and fruit etc contaminated with Samonella and Listeria across the EU and some of the major Supermarkets in the UK having been found selling fake herbs and condiments etc to consumers.

However I believe outside the issues of policing and such cases being prosecuted - there is now a seperate issue of legitimate food producers being targeted as part of movement towards promoting individual lifestyle choices. There was a very funny Halloween cartoon I saw - of a rather confused householder attempting to navigate the dangers of handing out treats to kids on specific diets. I'll see if I can find it ...

brynne

duploelabs wrote: »

No, we have to, by law, label our products if they contain one or more of the recognised allergens. There is no same legislation when it comes to labelling something if it is vegan or not

Apologies. My post was badly worded. In saying " ... vegan or non-vegan", I intended to mean that it was actually the allergy legislation that applied, regardless.

pedroeibar1

duploelabs wrote: »

Dried blood banned??
The majority of black pudding uses dried, and I believe you've to have very special dispensation to use fresh

Wine needs to be clarified or sometimes have certain tastes removed. The product used in this process is a ‘fining agent’ and almost all of them are animal or fish based. Inorganic ones exist but they remove too much other matter, including colour, aroma/bouquet and flavour, and are not favored. Dried blood was among the most frequent until the BSE scare when the EU and the US banned the use of blood as a fining agent. AFAIK the ban for use of bovine blood for any human foodchain product (e.g. feed for farmed fish) has not yet been lifted. Black pudding contains porcine dried blood, which, while very heavily regulated is not banned.

pedroeibar1

gozunda wrote: »

As to your points - I would agree. Though these issues are fairly widespread globably. If I remember correctly the Ballybay case concerned Northern Ireland and cross border jurisdictions. Its not just meat products either - there have serious of cases of salad products and fruit etc contaminated with Samonella and Listeria across the EU and some of the major Supermarkets in the UK having been found selling fake herbs and condiments etc to consumers.

However I believe outside the issues of policing and such cases being prosecuted - there is now a seperate issue of legitimate food producers being targeted as part of movement towards promoting individual lifestyle choices. There was a very funny Halloween cartoon I saw - of a rather confused householder attempting to navigate the dangers of handing out treats to kids on specific diets. I'll see if I can find it ...

There are two separate issues - listeria, salmonella, etc., 'happen', are inadvertent and are caught quickly. Dioxin (the pork scandal) and false labeling are 'caused' by fraud and criminality. The latter are much more common than the former. The Ballybay cases were pure criminality - the pork case in the 1980's was mis-labeling foreign pork as Irish; they chicken was worse, with frozen chicken from Thailand being thawd and packaged as Irish. It wasn't a Border issue.

There are agendas - Iceland (stores) was forced to pull its Christmas advert because it was deemed too political.

gozunda

pedroeibar1 wrote: »

There are two separate issues - listeria, salmonella, etc., 'happen', are inadvertent and are caught quickly. Dioxin (the pork scandal) and false labeling are 'caused' by fraud and criminality. The latter are much more common than the former. The Ballybay cases were pure criminality - the pork case in the 1980's was mis-labeling foreign pork as Irish; they chicken was worse, with frozen chicken from Thailand being thawd and packaged as Irish. It wasn't a Border issue.
There are agendas - Iceland (stores) was forced to pull its Christmas advert because it was deemed too political.

Regarding bacterial contamination - I would disagree that they just 'happen'. For example the Europewide contamination of cucumbers by salmonella has been ongoing since 2014 with cases being reported each year since.

Irrigation with sewage‐contaminated water (cases of Hepatitis A*) has also been linked to fruit such as berries. companies repacking imported berries and keeping origin information vague.
It is likley there are also elements of fraud or criminality in some of these food production methods. The packaging and sale of fake herbs, spices and condiments certainly is.

I'm not doubting any of the food fraud issues you've listed btw. Not to digress further - the point made is the very different issue of food producers being targeted by certain types of lifestyles extremists. These seem to be on the rise unfortunately.


*eg See https://www.fsai.ie/faq/frozen_berries.html