Food Standards Australia New Zealand (FSANZ) yesterday released its draft assessment of a petition filed by functional food maker So Natural Foods for the addition of calcium to rice and oat-based drinks.
Currently, Australia allows added calcium, as well as other vitamins and minerals, to certain foods such as breakfast cereals, most dairy products, and soy-based beverages and yoghurts.
But calcium can only be added to cereal-based beverages as a food additive, which means that manufacturers cannot use content claims to inform consumers of the presence of the mineral.
However manufacturers appear to be making such claims anyway, in a bid to support the use of cereal-based drinks as an alternative to dairy products.
The FSANZ assessment points to three Australian manufactured rice beverages that contain calcium phosphate or calcium carbonate as food additives at levels equivalent to that permitted for soy beverages.
All three product labels include content claims such as 'calcium enriched', 'calcium equal to milk' and 'high in calcium', "which appear to be inconsistent with current permissions in the code", it said.
After a prior consultation, FSANZ has now recommended a change to its standard 1.3.2 to allow cereal-based beverages containing no less than 0.3 per cent protein to be fortified with the same vitamins and minerals as those permitted for beverages derived from legumes.
The products should also carry an advisory statement to the effect that the product is not suitable as a complete milk replacement for children under the age of twelve years, it said.
Australian supermarket retail sales of cereal-based beverages totalled 3,800,000 litres for the year ending April 2005, compared to 47 million litres of soy beverages sold there in 2004.
The authority has also opened the consultation process on a petition filed by Coca-Cola to add cholesterol-lowering phytosterols to fruit juice and juice drinks.
The company has already received approval for such a product in the US, where it launched in 2002 under the Minute Maid brand, and more recently in the UK, where the food authority approved the novel food in February although this opinion has been forwarded by the European Commission to other member states for comment.
Phytosterols are already allowed in table spreads and margarines in Australia and New Zealand, and their use in low-fat milk, yoghurt and breakfast cereals is under consideration.
Analysts predict that Australia's fruit juice industry will explode over the next few years, led by the strong emergence of juice bars. These outlets are expected to double their current $150 million (€90.5 million) turnover in 2005, taking their share of Australia's $1 billion juice industry to 30 per cent.
Comments on the above assessments can be sent to FSANZ before 6pm on 14 September 2005.