Hot News: stricter regulation against illegal activities of food products online sales by CFDA

China CFDA starts to implement stricter regulation against illegal activities of food products sold online since the date of Oct 01, 2016. In accordance with the new regulation, within China Mainland any 3rd e-platforms providing services to food distributors or self-owned e-platforms specialized in food product operation will have to be subject to it, which means the above 2  e-platforms firstly need to submit required documents to achieve filing number approved by local FDA, and moreover food operators running business on either of above 2 e-platforms will have to present required business license (food circulation certificate issued by the administration for industry and commerce, which has been required by Taobao.com) and personal information for further enforcement activities, tracking and social supervision. Meanwhile 3rd e-platforms are going to complete management mechanism to monitor the online food distributors and market activities; and filing duration should be extended to 6 months after the shelf-life of food products. To my knowledge, e-platforms like Kaola.com already applies stricter pre-assessment procedures in prior to distributors allowed in. But this regulation is going to call for more attention from staff of merchant sector of each leading 3rd e-platforms.

For categories of health food, foods for special medical purpose and infant formula, registration of filing certificate will also be required to present for public supervision. Distributors of infant formula should sell products of dairy suppliers approved by CIQ.

The government further raises the benchmark of food industry for food safety Concerns in China; and puts more efforts to stopping sham advertisement which might mis-lead consumers. From the point of view of CFDA, it is expected that regulation will be going stricter in the future with more engagement directly from the government; and living space of food distributors is facing bigger challenges. However, we will also need to be explained with some confusion of the regulation, like if companies registering at Hong Kong (cross-border e-platforms) will they also be subject to the management of this very regulation; and for CBEC model, registration certificate for infant formula, health food is not a must yet, so if this could be another conflict between the new regulation and grace period granted after CBEC policy published?

Have you read about this regulation already？ Or you have any comments on that, I am happy with your feedback.