China's Food and Food Packaging Laws Year-in-Review | From The Year of the Dog to The Year of the Pig

In 2018, the food and food packaging industry witnessed many changes within China's regulatory system, beginning with the National People's Congress (NPC) - China's national legislative body - embarking on a massive restructure of its organizational bodies, which extended to many of its food regulatory agencies.

Details of China's reshuffle was reported in Keller and Heckman's China Regulatory Matters (CRM) newsletter in March 2018 - China's National People's Congress Passes Reshuffle Plan to Establish New Food and Food-Related Agencies.

Since then, structural reforms and nomenclature changes have been taking place among and within different governmental agencies at both national and local levels, including the State Administration for Market Regulation (SAMR), General Administration of Customs (GAC), and National Health Commission (NHC), bringing substantial changes to how the food industry will be administered in practice. Now that the reshuffle is fully in place at the central level, we expect to see a continuous roll-out of regulations and standards in 2019 to accommodate the restructured food regulatory system. Let's take a closer look at what we have seen in 2018 and how things may play out in 2019.

CONTINUE READING ON www.foodpackagingforum.org:

I. Food Safety Standards Under Further Development

II. Regulations on Special Foods to Be Strengthened

III. Challenges and Opportunities for Imported Foods Remain

IV. Food Packaging

V. Outlook for 2019