Is a 'May Contain' Statement Mandatory? Legal and Safety Implications
Hi Everyone,
Hope you all are doing well. Just want to know if giving may contain statement on the label is mandatory and if not given what could be the consequences and if given is it able to protect company from leagal proceedings.
May contain should never be used to replace GMPs
However, (depending on the material in question) can be applied when you've done everything you can, but it may still be present
So, in order for it to be sufficient in a court of law, you'd have to be able to demonstrate you've done everything you possibly can to prevent it from being present
To me may contain statements are dubious at best.
In my experience, May Contains hold no legal standing. If the allergen is not in the contains statement, but present in the product (even with a may contain statement), it will still be recalled 100%. It helps the consumer who make an informed decision to know what other allergens are processed in the facility, though.
I have handled product that was non-allergen and it contained a random cashew within the bulk product from the supplier. The case had a may contains statement for cashews, but ultimately, the product was recalled per FDA. Consult with a food lawyer for more details.
thanks all, looking at our suppliers, who are giving each and everything in the may contain statement we might end up having it on our label too.
thanks all, looking at our suppliers, who are giving each and everything in the may contain statement we might end up having it on our label too.
It might be worth forcing them down a risk assessment route for each allergen. You could do it as a questionnaire if liked. For example, setting out each allergen on site, asking for information on if it's used on the same equipment as food without the allergen, has validated cleaning taken place if that's the case? Also if any of the allergens are dusty or could be aerosolised etc etc.
We had an ingredient once for a short time when there was that scare with flour and potential mustard cross contamination. In the end I decided not to include it on the packaging. I was shown no strong evidence it was a risk. There was evidence it was potential cross reactivity with oil seed rape which had caused the original positive ELISA test and if present, we weren't able to find it in the ingredient which was a sub ingredient in our product.
Some pragmatism I think needs to reign in this. Yes protect for risk but genuinely understand the risk first. Throwing on may contain statements is painful for allergenic consumers and widely ignored as a result anyway. Even if it was effective at covering your a**e which I'm not sure it is, that's all it does.
It might be worth forcing them down a risk assessment route for each allergen. You could do it as a questionnaire if liked. For example, setting out each allergen on site, asking for information on if it's used on the same equipment as food without the allergen, has validated cleaning taken place if that's the case? Also if any of the allergens are dusty or could be aerosolised etc etc.
We had an ingredient once for a short time when there was that scare with flour and potential mustard cross contamination. In the end I decided not to include it on the packaging. I was shown no strong evidence it was a risk. There was evidence it was potential cross reactivity with oil seed rape which had caused the original positive ELISA test and if present, we weren't able to find it in the ingredient which was a sub ingredient in our product.
Some pragmatism I think needs to reign in this. Yes protect for risk but genuinely understand the risk first. Throwing on may contain statements is painful for allergenic consumers and widely ignored as a result anyway. Even if it was effective at covering your a**e which I'm not sure it is, that's all it does.
I know that in the UK, there is discussions around the use of PAL's..
Lots of suppliers limit there end user market by adding pals for all allergens handled on site.
https://www.food.gov...ergen-labelling
But through your own continuous improvement/ allergen validations you should be able to remove pals.
Think about your own cross contamination routes in your factory....
BUT you have to be able to prove (validate/verify) that there is no allergen cross contamination,
Elisa swabs in triplicate annually to validate cleaning procedures is how i have proved it to my auditors the last few years...
In my experience, May Contains hold no legal standing. If the allergen is not in the contains statement, but present in the product (even with a may contain statement), it will still be recalled 100%. It helps the consumer who make an informed decision to know what other allergens are processed in the facility, though.
I have handled product that was non-allergen and it contained a random cashew within the bulk product from the supplier. The case had a may contains statement for cashews, but ultimately, the product was recalled per FDA. Consult with a food lawyer for more details.
I once evaluated an ingredient for use in my facility, and on the spec in said "May contain" and just listed every allergen known to man.
I passed, lol...