Naoise Ó Cearúil (Kildare North, Fianna Fail)
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872. To ask the Minister for Health her plans to encourage Irish businesses to provide food information bilingually to promote the Irish language; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [25886/25]

Naoise Ó Cearúil (Kildare North, Fianna Fail)
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873. To ask the Minister for Health the reason bilingual labelling will not be part of the agenda of the cross-Government working group, given the inclusion of the option to provide food information bilingually on a voluntary basis within Ireland’s transposition of the FIC Regulation; and if she will make a statement on the matter. [25887/25]

Jennifer Carroll MacNeill (Dún Laoghaire, Fine Gael)
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I propose to take Questions Nos. 872 and 873 together.

Food labelling in the EU is governed by Regulation (EU) No. 1169/2011 on the provision of food information to consumers (FIC). In Ireland, bilingual labelling is provided for in S.I. No. 556/2014 – European Union (Provision of Food Information to Consumers) Regulations 2014.

This legislation provides that mandatory food information shall appear in a language easily understood by the consumers of the Member States where a food is marketed; and within their own territory and that Member States in which a food is marketed may stipulate that the particulars shall be given in one or more language(s) from among the official languages of the Union.

Ireland transposed this legislation providing food business operators (FBOs) the flexibility to ensure that food placed on the market is accompanied by mandatory food information in (a) the English language, or (b) the Irish language and the English language. This flexibility was provided to ensure that the legislation was not creating a barrier to intra-EU trade with some member states having different information requirements and not to increase the burden on businesses as it may be necessary for FBOs to produce separate labels for different markets.

Encouraging Irish businesses to provide food information bilingually to promote the Irish language is a matter for the Department of Tourism Culture Arts Gaeltacht Sport and Media.

In May of 2020, The European Commission proposed revisions to the FIC Regulation under the Farm to Fork Strategy and Europe’s Beating Cancer Plan. The Commission has yet to indicate when the labelling aspect of the FIC revision will be progressed, nor has it confirmed a date when its proposed impact assessment is likely to be published.

The Department of Health has legislative responsibility for the FIC Regulation and is tasked with coordinating the development of Ireland’s position on the proposed changes to the Regulation via an Inter-departmental Group (IDG), which it chairs. The IDG’s objectives are to discuss, develop and agree Ireland’s position on the Commission’s revisions to the FIC Regulation. As the Commission has not progressed its proposals, the Group has not met recently. The Commission’s proposed revision of the FIC Regulation does not include any changes to bilingual labelling and, therefore, this is not included in the IDG’s remit.