New supplement laws phased in - goodnews - dietary supplements, Canada - Brief Article

Better Nutrition, Sept, 2003

Dietary supplements and similar natural products sold in Canada will be regulated by the government under new laws to be phased in over the next 6 years. Health Canada--which functions much like the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA)--will oversee a licensing process that requires detailed information about a product's medicinal and non-medicinal ingredients, source, potency and recommended use.

Approved products will bear a license number on their labels, which are also being standardized to include safety and efficacy information. Herbs, homeopathic substances, vitamins, minerals, probiotics, amino acids, essential fatty acids and so-called traditional medicines are all included under the new regulations.

In the United States, most natural products fall under the 1994 Dietary Supplements Health Education Act, which contains no licensing provisions. The National Nutritional Foods Association, a nonprofit trade organization for natural products, expressed its concern in a detailed letter to the Canadian government about "the adverse impact on US-Canadian trade, and on US manufacturers and distributors of dietary supplements who market their products in Canada."

Figures obtained by BN from the FDA for 1997 indicate that the United States imports $40.89 million in vitamins from Canada, while exporting $116.8 million. For minerals, the numbers are $39.88 million for imports and $40.89 million for exports. The United States also exports $22.4 million in botanicals and herbals to Canada but imports relatively few of these products.