Thailand notifies WTO members of plans to introduce alcohol warning labels

According to the draft Alcoholic Beverage Control Act, labels affixed on alcohol containers manufactured in or imported to the Kingdom of Thailand shall not have any word or message which may lead consumers to understand that the alcoholic beverage is safe or has a positive effect on health or has the level of substance which is less toxic to health than alcoholic beverage in general, or have any word or message which is deemed as advertising alcoholic beverage whether or not directly or indirectly.

The draft text also requires labels to carry any of the following messages:

-Drinking alcohol causes hypertension liver cirrhosis

-Alcohol intoxication leads to the accidents

-Drinking alcohol leads to unconsciousness and even death

-Drinking alcohol leads to inferior sexual performance

-Drinking alcohol leads to adverse health effect and family problems

-Drinking alcohol is a bad influence on children and young people

The Thai law will require the graphic health warning to be no less than 30% to 50% of the size of the alcohol container.

The warning labels shall rotate every 1,000 packages.

To read the full text of the notification sent by Thailand click here

Members (including the EU) are in the process of responding. The EU has already sent its comments to the Thai Government.

In its comments the EU asks the Thai authorities what is the scientific evidence to suggest that the conditions described in the messages are generally caused by any level of alcohol consumption.

It reminds the Thai authorities that the TBT Agreement states that Members shall ensure that technical regulations are not adopted with a view to create unnecessary obstacle to international trade and so they shall not be more trade-restrictive than necessary to fulfil a legitimate objective (inter alia the protection of human health or safety).

The EU points out that according to its experience public policies aiming to modify drinking behaviour should be approached in a holistic manner for instance also encompassing information and education campaigns and it asks the Thai authorities whether they have undertaken (or considered to) also other alternatives.

The EU also invites the Thai authorities to take into consideration les trade-restrictive measures or failing this, to provide clarification on which basis and evidence the Thai authorities believe that different less costly and burdensome alternatives would be insufficient to address the objective pursued.

To consult the comments made by the EU: http://ec.europa.eu/enterprise/tbt/tbt_repository/THA332_EN_4.pdf