Alcohol & Health

Responsible Drinking – Cellar Door Resources.

We want to ensure visitors to Australia’s cellar doors have a great experience, for all the right reasons.

Australian Grape & Wine recognises the importance of industry providing consumers with information about alcohol content and health messages about responsible drinking, so they can make informed choices about their own alcohol consumption.

With approximately eight million visitors to wineries across Australia annually, multiple tastings on offer at each cellar door and multiple cellar doors visited, consumers need an easy and effective means to track their drinking, especially if they are driving.

This is why Australian Grape & Wine has partnered with DrinkWise to create resources designed to increase consumer understanding of how many pours (tastings) add up to a standard drink.  The resources provide a practical solution for consumers to moderate their drinking during their winery visits and have been provided to over 1,700 cellar doors across Australia.

Read More…

Download Drinkwise Cellar Door Materials

Health Labelling

CODEX: Food Labelling of Alcoholic Beverages

The global pressure being applied around the world to regulate and implement policies to address alcohol related impacts on public health has been steadily growing for a number of years and is now coming to a head. These efforts are influenced at an international level by organizations such as the World Health Organization (WHO) that are systematically trickling down into national, state and local government positions on how they manage and regulate alcohol and health.

There are a number of broad measures being driven as a means of addressing alcohol related harm including taxation and other fiscal measures, restrictions of sale and promotion, health guidelines and labelling. In particular, labelling is seen by these influencers as an effective mechanism of influencing consumers at point of sale and consumption about the health risks associated with alcohol consumption. However, it also imposes the greatest cost burden on businesses particularly in an international context where producers are having to amend labels for multiple markets.

We have seen these labelling influences already impacting in Australia with pregnancy warnings and soon to be finalised energy labelling requirements being established. We have seen it beginning to impact our international markets as well, such as Irelands cancer warning labels, proposals for graphic health warnings in Thailand and the Europeans Unions recent changes to Nutrition and Ingredient labelling and proposals for broad health warning labelling.

There is now a much broader threat to alcoholic beverage labelling being driven by the WHO through the Codex Committee on Food Labelling (CCFL). This work has the potential to significantly influence wine labeling requirements across the world and impose significant cost burden on Australian wine producers.

At its next meeting in October 2024, CCFL will consider a WHO drafted discussion paper on Labelling of Alcoholic Beverages that is seeking to influence governments to impose mandatory labelling for alcoholic beverages, including, among other things:

• mandatory labelling requirements relating to links between alcohol and cancer, violence, suicide and addiction
• mandatory nutrition-related information – e.g. energy value (calories), total sugars, proteins, fat, and
• mandatory health-related information – e.g. alcoholic strength, drinking guidelines, and risks of consuming alcohol during pregnancy.

If the CCFL develops new mandatory labelling for alcoholic beverages, it is likely that these will be adopted in a number of export markets and Australian exporters will need to make changes to their labels in order to comply.

The Australian wine sector and our Government needs to understand the significant risk this poses to the viability of our sector and proactively work with international colleges and other sectors to mitigate the impacts.

Click here to read the discussion paper, prepared by Australian Grape & Wine, which provides broader information about the CCFL Discussion Paper on the Labelling of Alcoholic Beverages and consideration of next steps for the Australian wine sector.

Pregnancy Labelling

Requirements for mandatory pregnancy warning labels on packaged alcoholic beverages were gazetted in the Australia New Zealand Food Standards Code (the Code) on 31 July 2020.

Businesses had three years from 31 July 2020 to implement these requirements.

Packaged alcoholic beverages with more than 1.15% alcohol by volume for retail sale in Australia and New Zealand (or sold as suitable for retail sale without any further processing, packaging or labelling) must display a pregnancy warning label, except when the beverage is packaged in the presence of the purchaser.

This exception means, for example, wine or beer served in a glass at a restaurant or bar, fill your own container at a bottle store, or additional packaging applied in the presence of the retail purchaser, are not required to display a pregnancy warning label.

The requirement to display a pregnancy warning label applies to, for example, relevant packaged alcoholic beverages that are:

• made and packaged on the premises from which they are offered for retail sale
• delivered packaged and ready for consumption, at the express order of the retail purchaser
• sold at a fund raising event
• displayed in an assisted service display cabinet
• sold from a vending machine 2
• sold at retail in a hamper.

Download full FSANZ Q&A Document

For further information on label design elements and downloadable labels visit the FSANZ Website.

National Alcohol Strategy

The National Alcohol Strategy 2019-2028 has been endorsed by Federal, State and Territory Health Ministers and was released on Monday 3 December 2019. On balance, the strategy reasonable – recognising that trends in dangerous drinking are heading in the right direction, and focusing on options governments can consider to prevent and treat alcohol related harms. Importantly, please note the strategy does not impose binding commitments on any government, but it can provide the political impetus to pursue some of the options in the plan.

While Minimum Unit Pricing is put forward as an option for governments to consider, along with changes to a volumetric tax system, the Minister for Health, the Hon. Greg Hunt MP, said in his press release that “The Morrison Government considers Australia’s current alcohol taxation setting are appropriate and has no plans to make any changes” and “pricing mechanisms such as a Minimum Unit Price on alcohol are a matter for the States and Territories.” A Minimum Unit Price for alcohol would be damaging for the sector, and early indications from the Northern Territory’s experiment with such measures suggest it is leading to perverse outcomes. We will continue to watch this space and advocate against the introduction of Minimum Unit Pricing in Australia. On a more pleasing note, the strategy also suggests that Responsible Service of Alcohol (RSA) arrangements be standardised nationally, which is an issue many members have raised with us. Australian Grape & Wine will use this as a basis for pursuing reform in this area in the coming year, although we expect getting the states and territories onto the same page will take time.

DrinkWise FASD Program 2018-2021

DrinkWise advises women to abstain from alcohol if planning a pregnancy, pregnant or breastfeeding, in line with government guidelines. Current programs and new initiatives will assist in raising awareness of the risks and effects of consuming alcohol during pregnancy, with the ultimate goal of preventing FASD.

Initiatives include:

• Primary Care Settings (waiting rooms of general practices)
• Aboriginal Medical Services and Select GP locations
• Community Education FASD
• Community radio programs
• Print media
• Labelling on products and packaging (Supply and promotion of labelling logos)
• DrinkWise Website Portal 
• Point of Sale – Liquor Stores / Hotels / Cellar doors / Winery restaurants
• Outdoor advertising
• Online advertising

More information on FASD can be found at www.DrinkWise.org.au

Other Resources

The wine industry also:

• helps fund the operations of DrinkWise Australia, which runs national information and education campaigns designed to change Australia’s drinking culture
• helps fund and manage the Alcohol Beverage Advertising Code (ABAC) which, with Government support, provides advertising guidelines and a pre-vetting service to industry and adjudicates on public complaints about alcohol advertising
• runs the National Wine Foundation, which funds projects that address social problems which can lead to alcohol abuse.