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The Deadline to Meet Health Canada’s Food Labelling Requirements is December 14, 2023.


For organizations with a detailed plan, the upcoming deadline is fast approaching. Are you ready?

  • Update product labels according to Health Canada’s food labelling requirements.
  • Schedule your products for image and data capture to ensure your trading partners have access to your updated, compliant nutritional information.

Schedule your products now

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In December 2016, the Government of Canada announced changes to food labelling regulations in support of Health Canada’s Healthy Eating Strategy to help Canadians make heathier, more informed choices.

This initiative requires Canadian organizations to make food labelling changes to their products’ Nutritional Facts Tables and ingredient listings. Full details are outlined in the Amendments to the Food and Drug Regulations Related to Nutrition Labelling, List of Ingredients and Food Colour Regulations.


Health Canada has announced that it has extended the deadline for this initiative to December 14, 2023, for those organizations that have a detailed plan showing how they intend to meet these requirements at the earliest possible time.

Once you’ve updated your product labels to meet the new regulations, make sure to submit your products for image and data capture. Then certify your nutritional content to ensure your trading partners have access to your updated, compliant nutritional information.

Schedule products for imaging


If you have reformulated your product or adjusted the size of your packaging, you may need a new GTIN. Click here for our GTIN Management Support Tool or click here for more information about the Global Trade Item Number (GTIN).


These labelling changes require updated packaging. Once you have updated your product label to meet the new nutritional requirements, you will have to:

  1. Submit your products for Product Image and Data Capture.
  2. Log in to myGS1 and certify your products in Product Certification – Nutritional Content and/or update ECCnet Registry to ensure your trading partners have uninterrupted access to your updated, compliant nutritional information (subject to applicable fees).

These steps will give your trading partners confidence in the accuracy of your product content and ensures your compliance with Health Canada requirements.



Benefits to certifying your updated nutritional content:

  • 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 standard Nutrition Facts Tables.
  • 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.


We are here to help. If you have any questions or require assistance, please contact us at 1.800.567.7084 or ECCnetSupport@gs1ca.org.


Health Canada Food Labelling Requirements - FAQ


Health Canada has announced that it has extended the original December 2022 deadline to December 14, 2023, for those organizations that have a detailed plan showing how they intend to meet the new requirements. For more information about the regulations, click here.

These amendments will improve the nutrition facts table and list of ingredients to make them easier to understand thereby helping Canadians make informed choices. Food labels will become standardized to make the Nutrition Facts table and list of ingredients on packaged food easier for Canadians to use and understand.

To learn more about the regulatory requirements visit: https://www.canada.ca/en/health-canada/services/food-labelling-changes.html

Over the past four years, GS1 Canada has been aligning our systems with the changes to nutritional content so that mandatory attributes are in place for the new regulatory requirements to help with compliance. Our systems are up-to-date to enable the flow of accurate and complete data between trading partners.

The brand owners/manufacturers can use our systems to remain compliant to regulatory requirements, enabling their business to align with trading partner business needs. The responsibility is on data providers to provide compliant data.

No, you continue to update ECCnet Registry, or Product Certification – Nutritional, with any changes to product content as you normally would.

Review the food labelling regulatory requirements (see link above) and assess changes required on product labels, then:

  1. Update product packaging and nutrition label in alignment with Health Canada guidelines,
  2. For Foodservice products update ECCnet Registry with nutritional content changes,
    1. Food Label Version = 2017
    2. Provide all relevant nutritional content
  3. For Retail Grocery products:
    1. Submit products to GS1 Canada Content Capture services to capture new product label information and images,
    2. Once updated nutritional content has been loaded to Product Certification – Nutritional:
      1. Specify Food Label Version = 2017
      2. Review and certify updated nutritional content
  4. If you maintain nutritional content in both ECCnet and Product Certification, for example products applicable to both Foodservice and Grocery channels, then do both the steps above.

You may need a new GTIN if you have re-formulated your product. To find out more, please go to gs1ca.org/standards/global-trade-item-numbers and select “When to Get New GTINs – GTIN Management Standards”.


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