Misunderstood food date labels cost US families thousands of dollars each year. New FDA efforts to standardize labels and practical tips can help you save money and reduce waste.
To reduce confusion, the FDA and USDA have been pushing manufacturers to voluntarily adopt the phrase “best if used by” to signify quality rather than safety. Research shows this terminology is more likely to be correctly interpreted by consumers.
Climate Town had a great video on the whole expiration date thing. It started off by manufacturers to help keep stock rotated and often were cryptic and not at all consistent. It was never meant as any guarantee of anything, and are mostly estimates.
From the article:
So they aren’t even making it a rule?
I was also hoping they would make rules about legibility and date formats (ideally ISO 8601 based)
Climate Town had a great video on the whole expiration date thing. It started off by manufacturers to help keep stock rotated and often were cryptic and not at all consistent. It was never meant as any guarantee of anything, and are mostly estimates.
So rather than asking them to make it useful, they’re asking the companies to make it clearer that it isn’t useful
Yes. Ensuring the language isn’t misleading is good.