Thailand has been making various amendments to the labelling regulations for food and beverage products , including stricter criteria for on-pack health claims, laying the onus on manufacturers for the inclusion of clear information on labels and recently revising the Healthy Choice logo eligibility criteria for several products.
According to the local Thai Food and Drug Administration (Thai FDA), feedback from the industry has indicated that these changes have not solved some core, practical labelling issues, thus another round of public opinion is being sought on new changes to labelling criteria.
“Currently we are seeing multiple complaints and various parties highlighting practical problems of displaying required information, i.e. energy values, sugar, fat and sodium, in the required Guideline Daily Amount (GDA) labelling format,” the agency said via a formal Ministry of Public Health (MoPH) announcement.
“This has hindered various manufacturers from fully complying with MoPH regulation requirements under the Food Act.
“Some of the main issues have included colouration as there is currently a list of only three specific colours (black, dark blue and white) which are permitted for the nutritional information display box but this also needs to contrast with the label background colour; and that some packaging will not be able to provide a white background (e.g. corrugated boxes for instant noodles) as specified too.
“As such, the FDA has considered and sees it fit to amend these requirements so as to both enhance compliance and flexibility, as well as to prevent the creation of any trade barriers by falling more in line with international standards.”
A key amendment that has been made in the draft announcement has been changing the mandatory colour scheme, so that the colour of the GDA label box/cylinder are the same as the letter inside the box but not limited to black, dark blue or white. This must all still be in contrast with the background label colours.
Another key change has been to the colour within the GDA label – white is still mandated for all products except in the case of ‘large packaging containers containing multiple quantities of food, packed in the same container that is wrapped for sale and restrictions are present preventing the colour white as the background’.
In these cases, the background colour is allowed to be ‘any colour’ e.g. the colour of a corrugated cardboard box, as long as the information is still clearly legible.
“We have carefully considered the problems faced by industry in changing labelling, and have decided to adjust the colour requirements to be more practical in both cases,” said the ministry.
“In all cases, the most important is for the information to be clearly visible and legible.”
Thai FDA has opened these draft regulations to public comment until April 30 2025, and all industry players are encouraged to send comments in via this link or to this email address.
GDA wording
GDA labelling is meant to enhance consumer awareness of particular nutrients, usually calories, sugar, salt and fat.
Thai FDA has also included a clause in the new draft which will allow manufacturers to use the term ‘Total Sugar’ or ‘Total Fat’ within the GDA depending on the situation, instead of just ‘Sugar’ or ‘Fat’ mandated previously, which will be important for manufacturers that would prefer to make a clear distinction e.g. for dairy products.
“This adjustment will enable manufacturers to be able to display additional nutrient text on the GDA label consistent with the text specified for display in the Nutritional Information table [so that the information is clearer for consumers],” it said.
