Noni juice application

Thursday 5 January 2006

A company has applied to have its noni juice products approved for sale on the grounds that it is 'substantially equivalent' to other products that have already been authorised.

Leap of Faith Farms wishes to market its noni juice obtained from noni fruit grown in Panama in four forms: pure fresh juice, fresh juice with 3-15% other fruit juices, fresh juice concentrated and frozen (for transport and subsequent reconstituting) and dried fresh juice (for transport and subsequent reconstituting). All of these would be marketed as ingredients in a pasteurised fruit drink.

Noni juice comes from the fruit commonly known as 'noni'. But it is also known as 'Indian Mulberry' and 'nonu'. The plant is also found in India, Africa and the West Indies. Its fruit are green until maturity, when they rapidly turn to a light yellow and then a translucent white.

An application for noni juice was approved in 2003 but this approval covers the applicant company only. However, regulation (EC) 258/97 makes provision for novel foods or ingredients that are substantially equivalent to an existing product to be placed on the market once the applicant has informed the European Commission.

In all cases to date, the Commission has required that the applicant first obtain an opinion on substantial equivalence from a Member State. Leap of Faith Farms is requesting such an opinion from Food Standards Agency on the equivalence of their noni juice ingredient with the approved noni juice produced by Tahitian Noni International, which is currently on the EU market.

The expert committee that advises the Agency on novel foods, the Advisory Committee on Novel Foods and Processes, will consider this application.

Any comments on this application should be sent to the ACNFP Secretariat by 26 January 2006 and will be passed to the Committee for consideration during its assessment of this novel food ingredient.