Recently, the National Health Commission and the State Administration for Market Regulation jointly released a series of national food safety standards, including the new national standard for vegetable oil that is closely related to consumer life - the National Standard for Food Safety of Vegetable Oil.

It is reported that the new national standard is a comprehensive revision of the "Hygienic Standards for Edible Vegetable Oils" (GB 2716-2005) and "Hygienic Standards for Fried Edible Vegetable Oils" (GB 7102.1-2003), which will be officially implemented on December 1, 2019. December 21st this year

Compared with the original standard, the main changes of the new national standard are the improvement of terminology and definitions, the deletion of the carbonyl value index of vegetable oil during frying, the modification of acid value and solvent residue index, and the addition of naming and labeling. Edible vegetable blended oil.

The new national standard has undergone more than 10 years of basic inspection and evaluation, and is currently an important basic standard in the field of edible oil.

As one of the concerns of the market and consumers, in order to protect consumers' right to know and regulate the market, this revision has added "Edible plant blended oil products should be named after 'Edible plant blended oil'" and "Edible plant blended oil". The oil label of vegetable blended oil should indicate the proportion of various edible vegetable oils, and encourage product names and mixed oil labels with a fatty acid content (mass fraction of total fatty acids) greater than 2% in edible vegetable oils.

That is to say, according to the new standards, consumers are accustomed to seeing edible oil products labeled with olive blend oil, soybean blend oil, walnut blend oil, etc. for sale. The naming of vegetable blended oil. So the ratio of olive oil to soybean oil can be indicated in the ingredient list. The proportion of edible blended oil is transparent to consumers, and they only need to look at the label to know what oil to add and the proportion.

In fact, in recent years, due to a lack of understanding of the nutritional components and formula ratios in blended oil products, consumers have increasingly called for a "public formula" for blended oil in their actual purchases. This time, the newly revised standard also specifies the labeling of vegetable oil components. On the premise of complying with the General Rules for Pre packaged Food Labeling of National Food Safety Standards and relevant regulations, producers can use font not less than the ingredient label in or near the ingredient list, and indicate the proportion of various edible vegetable oils.

For example, when labeling ingredients, they can be labeled as "soybean oil (50g/100g), corn oil (30g/100g), rapeseed oil (20g/100g)", or "soybean oil (50%)" "Corn oil (30%), rapeseed oil (20%)" or "soybean oil, corn oil, and rapeseed oil are added in a ratio of 5:3:2", and enterprises can choose either.

According to the new national standard, edible vegetable oils with ingredient ratios ≤ 5% are allowed a relative error of ± 10%, while edible vegetable oils with ingredient ratios greater than 5% are allowed a relative error of ± 5%. For pre packaged edible vegetable blended oils that are not directly provided to consumers, the proportion of various edible vegetable oils can be indicated on food labels, accompanying documents, instructions, contracts, or documents. Industry insiders believe that this provision of the new national standard is a mandatory disclosure of edible blended oil formulas. For a long time, the formula of blended oil has been a secret of manufacturers, and not disclosing it is a hidden rule in the industry. Now this "hidden rule" is about to be broken!

Meanwhile, it is worth noting that the new national standard clearly requires the indication of the raw material ratio of blended oil, while the fatty acid ratio can be marked as optional and not mandatory. Experts explain that this is mainly because some small businesses may not be able to accurately indicate the proportion of fatty acids and measure the content of ingredients in the formula if they require a mandatory fatty acid ratio. Meanwhile, some consumers may not understand. Of course, the standard also encourages companies with high technological levels to indicate not only the proportion of raw materials but also the proportion of fatty acids.

In addition, based on the characteristics of different types of vegetable oils, the new national standard refers to the relevant standards of the Codex Alimentarius Commission (CAC), combined with China's actual situation, for rice bran oil, palm (kernel) oil, corn oil, olive oil, cottonseed oil, coconut oil, etc. The acid values of different plant crude oils are specified separately. For solvent residue indicators, in order to ensure food safety, taking into account the actual consumption situation of vegetable oil, modern processing technology, and relevant testing data, the solvent residue of edible vegetable oil (including blended oil) produced by the extraction process is reduced to ≤ 20 mg/kg, and the requirement of "no solvent residue detection in pressed oil" is added, no longer requiring solvent residue indicators for vegetable crude oil. Experts explain that sunflower oil equipment and edible oil production use chemical solvents as production additives, so there will be a very small amount of solvent residue.

With the continuous improvement of technological level, production process, and production equipment, the residual amount of solvents continues to decrease. The new national standard further reduces the residual limit value, which is more conducive to people's physical health.

China is a major consumer of edible oil. In China's oil and fat market, there are not only popular edible oils such as corn oil, sunflower seed oil, soybean oil, rapeseed oil, peanut oil, etc. To meet the nutritional and flavor needs of consumers, there are still a large number of edible blended oils on the market. It is reported that the sales volume of small packaged edible blended oil in China has surpassed that of soybean oil, becoming a variety with a high market share in the small packaged oil market.

However, in stark contrast to the huge market size of blended oils, national standards for blended oils have long been absent, and the field of edible blended oils is filled with many poorly made and confusing concepts. For example, edible oil marketed as olive blended oil accounts for only 0.8% of the product due to its high cost. There are also edible oils labeled as peanut blended oil, but the peanut oil content is less than 2%.

Industry insiders introduce sunflower oil equipment. For a long time, due to the lack of national standards, China's edible vegetable oil market has been chaotic, making it difficult for consumers to distinguish between good and bad. Expected to clean up industry chaos.