Establishment of Customized Health Functional Food Sales Business and Introduction of Health Functional Food Managers for Safety Management
Temporarily Operated Under Regulatory Sandbox Due to Current Legal Restrictions
Industry 'Welcomes'... MFDS Also 'Sympathizes with the Purpose'
[Asia Economy Reporter Jeon Jinyoung] The ruling party, the People Power Party, is expected to invigorate the health functional food market by promoting a bill to establish a legal basis for customized health functional foods. Customized health functional foods refer to health functional foods developed or combined according to an individual's health condition or needs. Recently introduced programs that collect and send suitable health functional foods at once based on the user's input of their health status fall into this category.
According to political circles on the 6th, Representative Kang Gi-yoon of the People Power Party proposed a bill that introduces the concept of customized health functional foods, establishes a new sales business, and requires manufacturers to subscribe to liability insurance for consumer damage relief. The bill also includes provisions to introduce customized health functional food managers to oversee safety at business sites and to prohibit the sale of unreported customized health functional foods.
Under current law, health functional foods cannot be subdivided or combined and sold in different ways as consumers desire. This is due to concerns about potential hazards such as contamination during the subdivision process. However, to temporarily allow the business, the government has been operating a pilot project through a regulatory sandbox since April 2020.
In fact, Pulmuone Green Juice and Amorepacific have entered the customized health functional food business, leveraging the momentum of the regulatory sandbox. Pulmuone Green Juice launched a converged health functional food called 'Kanlove X2,' which combines green juice with function-specific capsules, selling over 300,000 bottles in just two months. They also launched 'Perfec,' an offline store service where affiliated professional nutritionists recommend necessary health functional foods to customers through consultations. Amorepacific also conducted related services once at the Amore Store Gwanggyo branch.
For these reasons, the industry welcomes the bill proposal. An industry insider said, "Customized health functional foods released after the regulatory sandbox have actually received positive market responses," adding, "If safety management guidelines are established through legalization, both companies and consumers will feel reassured."
The Ministry of Food and Drug Safety also sympathizes with the purpose of the bill, and discussions are expected to gain momentum. A ministry official said, "Safety was the biggest issue with customized health functional foods, but since safety has been verified through the pilot project, we now believe institutionalization is necessary," adding, "Especially, the bill to appoint professional management personnel is expected to gain significant support."
A representative from Kang's office explained, "The number of companies participating in the pilot project has increased significantly since the regulatory sandbox. Since both consumers and companies responded well, the bill was proposed," and added, "Unlike overseas, only Korea had regulations related to subdivision, which also contributed to the bill proposal."
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