Health Canada’s Food Labelling Regulations

Do Your Food Products Align with Health Canada’s New Labelling Regulations?

Health Canada has made changes to food product labelling to help Canadians make healthy and informed choices about the foods they purchase and consume by increasing visibility to ingredients and nutritional information.

Food manufacturers or distributors are responsible for ensuring all products sold in Canada adhere to these legislative and regulatory requirements. This may require organizations to reformulate products and/or make label changes and updates to product packaging.
Visit Health Canada's website to learn more about the Supplemented Foods Regulations Opens in a new window.

Ensure Trading Partners Have Access to Your Updated, Compliant Nutritional Information

Follow these steps to ensure our product registry reflects your most up-to-date product information and labels. Doing so will give your trading partners confidence in the accuracy of your product content:

  1. If you have reformulated your product or adjusted the size of your packaging, you may need a new Global Trade Item Number (GTIN). Click here for our GTIN Management Support Tool (opens in a new window) if your product requires a new GTIN.
  2. Once your product packaging has been updated to align with the Health Canada requirements, schedule your updated product(s) for image and data capture through the Content Capture Service Request.
  3. Once your product imaging is complete, you will be requested to archive the older version of your product content and certify your updated nutritional content.

    Please note that your retailers will not be able to access your updated product information until it has been certified.

New Health Canada Food Labelling Regulations

Changes to Nutrition Facts Table

Transition period ended December 2023

Learn more (opens in a new window) about the changes made to the nutrition facts table and the list of ingredients on food labels.

If you haven’t done so, submit your updated products for nutritional image and data capture.

New Front-of-Package Nutrition Labelling

Transition period ends December 31, 2025

Changes to Information on Sweeteners

Transition period ends December 31, 2025

Learn more (opens in a new window) about the changes to sweetener information on food labels, specifically for high-intensity sweeteners.

Changes to Supplemented Foods

Transition period ends December 31, 2025

Learn more (opens in a new window) about the new regulations pertaining to the sale of certain foods with permitted Supplemental Ingredients.

To improve understanding of food labels, register for the Health Canada Nutrition Labelling Online Course (opens in a new window).

Benefits to Certifying Your Updated Nutritional Content

Watch the video to learn why access to accurate nutritional information is so critical for both retailers and consumers.

Provide the highest level of data excellence from a primary source of truth.

Instill confidence through consistent access to standardized, bilingual, 100% accurate and complete nutritional content that supports regulatory requirements.

Highlight nutritional aspects of products that may not be included in the standard nutrition facts table.

Allows trading partners to identify products that meet changing consumer needs and support their health and wellness programs.

  • Including certification claims (halal, kosher, etc.), allergens and dietary information (gluten-free, etc.).

The rigour of the certification process delivers nutritional content that can be relied on to:

  • Fuel nutrition-related business processes.
  • Protect brand integrity.
  • Safeguard against reputational harm.
  • Protect the health and wellbeing of Canadian consumers.

If you have any questions or require assistance, please contact our subscriber support team.

FAQs

1. When do the new food labelling regulations go into effect? How can I learn more?

Health Canada has announced several labelling changes with different effective dates. For more information about the regulations, click here (opens in a new window).

2. What is the purpose of the new food labelling regulations?

Health Canada’s healthy eating strategy aims to make it easier for consumers to make healthier, more informed food choices by providing more visibility to product ingredients and nutrition facts on pack. Standardized food labels and changes like the front-of-pack nutritional symbol on packaged foods make it easier for Canadians to identify the right foods for them.

3. How is GS1 Canada supporting my business?

ECCnet Registry was created by Canadian industry to meet business needs for a national product registry providing access to a single source of trusted data. GS1 Canada regularly reviews Health Canada’s regulatory changes, and with industry direction, ensures that data requirements align with trading partner and regulatory requirements through ongoing system updates.

4. Has anything changed in how I upload or update my product content?

No. You can continue to update and certify your product data as you normally would.

5. If my food product label needs to be changed, what should I do?

Review the regulatory food labelling requirements (opens in a new window) to assess changes required on product labels, and then follow these steps:

  • Update product packaging and nutrition label in alignment with Health Canada guidelines.
  • If you have reformulated your product or adjusted the size of your packaging, you may need a new Global Trade Item Number (GTIN). Click here (opens in a new window) for our GTIN Management Support Tool.
  • For retail products:
    1. Submit products to GS1 Canada Content Capture services to capture new product label information and images.
    2. Once updated eCommerce and nutritional content has been loaded to Product Certification Specify Food Label Version = 2017.
    3. Review and certify updated eCommerce and nutritional content.
    4. Please note that your retailers will not be able to access your updated product information until it has been certified.
  • For your food products, please ensure the nutritional data in ECCnet Registry (via ProSYNC, EDI or GDSN) matches the new label.

If you require assistance, please email eccnetsupport@gs1ca.org.