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Mostly, food products in Vietnam are regulated by the Ministry of Health (MOH) and must meet certain safety, hygiene, and quality standards before they can be sold and consumed. MOH is mainly responsible for the supervision of food additive, food contact material, nutritional products used for kids up to 36 months, functional food including health supplement, foods for medical purposes, etc.
Other ministries and agencies may also regulate some food products in addition to MOH. For example, the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development (MARD) is responsible for the safety and quality of agricultural products, including fresh fruits and vegetables, livestock, and fishery products. The Ministry of Industry and Trade (MOIT) regulates packaged foods and beverages, including imported and Vietnamese domestically produced products. With assistance of other authorities, MOIT is the responsible authority to oversee the labelling and packaging requirements and ensure that imported food products meet Vietnamese standards. The legal framework of Vietnam’s labelling requirements is clarified as below.
1. Fundamental law and its implementation rules
The fundamental law governing food products in Vietnam is Law No. 55/2010/QH12 on Food Safety1 (Food Safety Law). In this law, Vietnam settles the essential requirements regarding food label, stating that:
Food products shall meet the regulations on packaging and labeling in addition to the consideration of food safety. It is forbidden to produce or trade food products in breach of labeling requirements. For foods with label errors, they can be corrected first. (Article 5, 10, and 55)
To ensure compliance, the law clarifies the obligations for involved parties. Food producers shall provide sufficient and accurate information of the products on the label, packaging or documents attached to food in accordance with the laws on good labeling. Food traders are responsible to check the label of food. (Article 7 and 8)
Food safety inspections will be carried out regularly or randomly by responsible competent authorities to ensure food safety, among which food labeling is an important check item. (Article 67)
Most importantly, elements that shall be remarked on food labels are detailed in Article 44, including the requirements for functional food, food additives, irradiated food and genetically modified (GM) food. Taking food additives as an example, phrase "phụ gia thực phẩm" [food additives] and other information on scope of use, doses and use methods must be remarked.
In 2012, Vietnam released Decree No. 38/2012 ND-CP detailing the implementation of food safety law, which is now replaced by Decree No. 15/2018/ND-CP Detailing the Implementation of a Number of Articles of the Food Safety Law2. Decree No. 15/2018 mainly explains:
Mandatory labeling items for foods, in addition to provisions on goods labeling (seen section 2). For example, imported products shall show the name of the organization or individual responsible for the content of the product label. (Article 24)
Situations where products can be exempted from the mandatory labeling. (Article 25)
Measures that will be taken to depose non-compliant products. E.g., if imported food products remains to be non-compliant after stakeholders taking measures for label errors, then the involved products will be re-exported or destructed. (Article 20)
The situation when foods containing genetically modified organism (GMO) shall be labelled or exempted from the GM labeling. (Article 10)
2. Specialized regulation for goods label
Besides the fundamental law and its implementation rules mentioned above, Decree No. 43/2017/ND-CP on Goods Labels3 is the most important regulation for stakeholders to learn, since it is a specialized regulation for product label. In 2021, some articles of Decree No. 43 were amended and supplemented by Decree 111/2021/ND-CP4. Without a compiled version, stakeholders should read both Decree No. 43/2017 and Decree 111/2021 to understand the provisions of goods labels. The two decrees stipulate:
Location of the label
Format of the label (label size; size of the letters and numbers on the label; colors of the letters, symbols and pictures on the label)
Language of the label
The labelling of sublabel
Enterprises’ responsibilities to label
The labelling of products including food additives
Mandatory items to be shown on the label: name of the goods, name and address of the enterprise responsible for the goods, origin of the goods and additional details prescribed in Appendix I of Decree 43/2017 and other relevant legal documents. For example, additional details of general food include quantitative information, date of manufacture, expiry date, composition and/or ingredient quantity, information and warnings, instructions for use, as well as preservation.
To be specific, key requirements include:
Except for some exemptions, the mandatory information on the label of imported products must be written in Vietnamese. (Article 7)
If the goods imported into Vietnam whose label do not represented or represented insufficiently mandatory information in Vietnamese, a sublabel containing mandatory information in Vietnamese is required, with the original label remaining unchanged. The Vietnamese content shall be consistent with the text on the original label. (Article 7)
The supplementary label shall be attached to the goods or commercial packaging without obscuring the mandatory information on the original label. (Article 8)
The content of the sublabel shall contain the Vietnamese translation of the mandatory information on the original label and other additional mandatory information according to the nature of the good as prescribed in the Decrees. The content displayed on the sublabel shall not mislead the information of the original label, and shall correctly reflect the nature and origin of the goods. (Article 8)
Food additives and food processing aids that are imported for manufacture without being sold in the market are exempted from sublabel requirements. (Article 8)
Please note that, previously, it was possible to import products into Vietnam without a sub-label at customs clearance (as indicated in Paragraph 4, Article 9 of Decree 43/2017). Only when the origin label failed to meet the goods labelling requirements, would the enterprises add sublabels for the product before putting it into the market. However, this provision was revised by Decree 111/2021, requiring the sublabel to be added before customs clearance. Violated goods not only need to supplement proper sublabels before they are allowed to do the customs clearance, but also are subject to administrative sanctions.
Besides the amendment in Decree 111/2021/ND-CP, some articles of Decree No. 43/2017 are also explained by Circular 05/2019/TT-BKHCN Providing Details for a Number of Articles of Decree No. 43/2017/ND-CP on Goods Labels5. For example, Circular 05/2019 explains the location of label in different cases; the labeling of ingredients, such as emphasizing the existence of an ingredient to attract consumers; conditions to label “no presence”, “not containing” and “no addition” of an ingredient; etc.
3. Regulations for specific products and topics
In addition to the general regulations, there are also some regulations worth attention that are especially for certain food categories or certain topics. For example,
Labelling requirements of supplementary food (common foods with beneficial ingredients for health), health supplement, foods for special medical purposes and foods for special dietary uses can be found in Circular 43/2014/TT-BYT on Functional Foods6.
Circular 24/2019/TT-BYT Guiding the Management and Use of Food Additives7 regulates that the labelling of food additives shall comply with Decree No. 43/2017 and other relevant documents. Circular 24/2019 also stipulates additional requirements. For example, for food additives that are to be divided, extracted, filled or repackaged, their labels must show the date of being divided, extracted, filled and repackaged.
In 2022, the Ministry of Science and Technology issued Circular No. 18/2022/TT-BKHCN8 on displaying goods’ labels by electronic means.
Moreover, enterprises shall keep a watchful eye on requirements raised in drafts. Vietnam is now drafting a regulation about nutritional labelling. The latest proposal about this draft is raised in April. ChemLinked assumes that the draft is expected to be released soon. Please stay tuned with ChemLinked.
ChemLinked Service
To meet the increasing demand of users' interest in Vietnam's food market, ChemLinked now provides relevant food consulting and registration services in Vietnam including label review, ingredient review, product declaration registration, etc.
For stakeholders wanting to explore more Vietnam’s compliance service, recommended resources are listed below.
Online course: Food Compliance and Import Procedures Interpretation in Southeast Asian Countries, Japan, and South Korea. The session on Vietnam provided a systematic introduction to food regulations, covering import procedure, as well as product compliance like hygiene requirements and food additive requirements.
Upcoming webinar: Vietnam's Imported Health Supplements Market and Compliance Requirements (June 20). In this webinar, challenges and opportunities for enterprises will also be explained.
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