DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH AND HUMAN SERVICES
Public Health Service

Food and Drug Administration
200 C Street, SW
Washington, DC 20204

December 21, 2000

Dear Colleagues,

As the U.S. Delegate to the Codex Committee on Nutrition and Foods for Special Dietary Uses (CCNFSDU), I am contacting you because of your past or potential interest in the activities of this committee.

In this letter, we provide information about how to access information on Codex activities via the Internet, and request information from you to help update our mailing list and facilitate communication with interested parties for this committee. In addition, we would like to invite your comments on several topics that were raised at the 22nd session of this committee that was held in June of 2000 in Berlin. First, however, I would like to thank those of you who served on the U.S. delegation at this meeting, and all of you who provided comments on the meeting's agenda items.

Keeping Abreast of CCNFSDU and Other Codex Activities

As most of you know, the Codex Alimentarius Commission is a subsidiary body of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations and the World Health Organization. It was established in 1962 to help protect the health of consumers and to facilitate trade through the establishment of international food standards, codes of practice and other guidelines. The CCNFSDU is responsible for studying nutritional problems referred by the Codex Alimentarius Commission and for drafting provisions on nutritional aspects for all foods and guidelines, general principles, and standards for foods for special dietary uses.

To keep abreast of U.S. Codex activities and circular letters for the CCNFSDU, you may want to periodically access the U.S. Codex Office homepage
( http://www.fsis.usda.gov/oa/codex/index.htm ). We are also pleased to announce that the FDA Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition and Center for Veterinary Medicine recently launched a web site that summarizes FDA food and veterinary medicine Codex activities ( http://vm.cfsan.fda.gov/~cjm/codex.html ). Please note that you can access the report for the 22nd session of the CCNFSDU at the FDA Codex web site. You can also obtain reports and other Codex documents from the Rome Codex web site: (http://www.fao.org/waicent/faoinfo/ECONOMIC/esn/codex/default.htm ).

We will also continue to periodically send communications to interested parties regarding CCNFSDU activities. Thus, if you would like to remain on the interested parties list, please complete and forward the attached form to Ms. Carolyn Curtis ( ccurtis@cfsan.fda.gov ) at FDA not later than January 16, 2001. If we don't hear from you, we will assume you are no longer interested in remaining on this mailing list.

The next CCNFSDU session is tentatively scheduled for November 26-30, 2001 in Berlin. In preparing the U.S. position for this meeting and in responding to Codex circular letters that request comments from member governments, we would like to consider the comments of U.S. interested parties.

Invitation to Comment on Issues Raised in Circular Letter 2000/22- CNFSDU

Attached for your reference is Circular Letter 2000/22- CNFSDU which invites governments to submit comments on several issues that were raised at the 22nd session. The topics addressed include:

- Draft Table of Conditions for Nutrient Contents (Part B- provisions for protein, vitamins and minerals) In: Guidelines for Use of Nutrition Claims

- Draft Table of Conditions for Nutrient Contents (Part B, containing provisions of dietary fibre) In: Guidelines for Use of Nutrition Claims

- Proposed Draft Guidelines for Vitamin and Mineral Supplements

- Proposed Draft Revised Standard for Infant Formula

[Note: The above four documents can be found in the appendices to the CCNFSDU 22nd session report. Please also note that the U.S. delegate to the CCNFSDU is chairing an international work group that will recommend revisions to Section 3.1 of the Draft Revised Standard for Infant Formula prior to the next meeting.]

- Discussion paper on vitamins and minerals in foods for special medical uses
[Note: This discussion paper can be accessed at:
( ftp://ftp.fao.org/codex/olddocs/Committees/ccnfsdu22/nf00_09e.pdf )]

- Discussion paper on energy conversion factors
[Note: This discussion paper can be accessed at:
(ftp://ftp.fao.org/codex/olddocs/Committees/ccnfsdu22/nf00_11e.pdf )]

- Discussion paper on risk-based approaches to nutrient intake assessment
[Note: This discussion paper can be accessed at:
( ftp://ftp.fao.org/codex/olddocs/Committees/ccnfsdu22/nf00_13e.pdf ) ]

If you would like to comment on any of the issues raised in the circular letter, we will need to receive your comments not later than Tuesday January 16 in order to consider them in preparing the U.S. response to this letter. Please send comments via e-mail to Ms. Nancy Crane ( ncrane@cfsan.fda.gov ) at FDA.

In closing, thank you again for your past interest in the work of this Codex committee. We look forward to your comments on this circular letter and in the coming year as we work to prepare for the next session of CCNFSDU.

Elizabeth A.Yetley, Ph.D.
Lead Scientist for Nutrition (and U.S. Delegate to CCNFSDU)
Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition