China’s National People’s Congress passed the draft reform of China’s Food Safety Law, which is now available for public comment, on July 1.

The Food Safety Law covers the overall food safety of China including regulations that oversee the dietary supplement industry, which is of great interest to the USCHPA and the global supplement industry.

All indicators have been pointing to China as a market with huge potential to be the largest market for dietary supplements and nutritional food ingredients. Here’s a list of some of those positive signs:

China has the largest consumer base in the world.

The Ministry of Health has been moving the healthcare system toward a more preventive system in which supplements are certainly a part.

China has been encouraging the move from an export driven economy to a consumption based one. Dietary supplements are consumer goods and fit nicely with increasing domestic consumption.

Chinese are among the most health conscious people in the world. With centuries of natural based therapies such as Traditional Chinese Medicine, Massage, herbal / food therapy ingrained in their culture.

Unfortunately, the regulations have been keeping the industry at bay and have essentially been stalling the explosive growth of the industry that one would expect.

USCHPA reported that China’s National People’s Congress has heard the plea for change from organizations, industry and consumers. It is time that the industry moves forward and gives Chinese consumers the same access to dietary supplements that the U.S. and other countries offer its citizens.

The USCHPA team is currently reviewing the entirety of the Food Safety Law and will be making comments. At this early time, the association reported that the new law has a notification amendment, which will allow certain supplements to simply record their products with China’s Food and Drug Administration (CFDA). To see a translation of articles 65 and 66, which discusses health food (dietary supplements) visit USCHPA’s site www.uschinahpa.orghttp://www.uschinahpa.org

Commenting is open until July 31. If you are interested in commenting, you can contact the association at info@uschinahpa.org