The California Assembly Bill 2316 aims to prohibit foods in schools sold during the school day that contain colour additives. If enacted, the Bill would ban Red Dye No. 40, Yellow Dye No. 5, Yellow Dye No. 6, Blue Dye No. 1, Blue Dye No. 2, and Green Dye No. 3, and the food additive titanium dioxide.

“It’s unlikely the bill will be welcomed by the food industry due to the complexity and costs it adds,” Rebecca Kaya, regulatory specialist at Ashbury, a regulatory consultant for retailers and manufacturers, told Ingredients Network.

The seven additives the proposed law would ban have been associated with hyperactivity including behavioural difficulties and decreased attention in children, Kaya says. In addition, the law also aims to eliminate colours banned in the European unio (EU) because of concern around genotoxicity, which refers to DNA damage that can cause cancer and impact immunity.

“The bill does not define ‘toxic’ but lists the specific synthetic colours that would be banned based on pre-existing scientific assessment and a state research assessment,” says Kaya.

However, the additives have already undergone safety assessments completed by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and are allowed in food nationally in the US. Due to these safety assessments and its existing presence, Kaya says: “This would make it hard to comply with a California-specific law.”

As the bill is also targeted at foods sold in schools, Kaya adds: “This could cause other distribution difficulties for products sold across multiple channels.”

Anticipated changes to school meals

If the new bill comes into force, it will only impact foods sold within school food service, as opposed to the broader manufacturing sector and brands selling their products in California and the US. “So the impact is probably minimal,” Kaya says.

The legislation would, however, require products containing these colours to be reformulated, relabelled or removed from distribution in the US by 2027. Reformulated products would still have to comply with other school nutrition requirements.

If products remain unchanged, they could still be sold at activities 30 minutes before and 30 minutes after the school bell but not during the school day. “If a brand chose to manufacture two versions of a product, one with and one without the additives, complying would require close management of the supply chain,” Kaya adds.

Food colour regulation in the EU and Great Britain

The proposed US ban on food additives only used in food and drinks served in schools is different from how the EU and Great Britain (GB) controls these food additives. All food additives in EU and GB are permitted in categories of food types. As a result, manufacturers or brands cannot use one food additive in any food. Instead, they must first look at the category of food in which it is permitted.

“One of the additives the US is banning is not permitted at all in either the EU or in Great Britain (England, Scotland and Wales), while others have been deemed to affect children’s activity levels and attention,” Kaya says. These are known as The ‘Southampton Six’ colours: Tartrazine (E102), Quinoline Yellow (E104), Sunset Yellow (E110), Carmoisine (E122), Ponceau 4R (E124) and Allura Red (E129).

Banning additives

“The fact they have only banned the colours in food in schools seems senseless to me,” says Kaya. “Either the colours are not a good idea in foods targeted at children/foods they regularly consume, and they should be regulated similarly to those in the UK or EU, or they are fine,” Kaya adds.