Consumer Labeling for Gluten in Japan

Gluten-free labeling essentially does not exist in Japan. Once in a blue moon, you may be wandering in a random Tokyo supermarket and happen upon a single package of imported rice pasta that says グルテンフリー (guruten furii, i.e. gluten-free). If you're like me, you will instantly pounce on the package and hold it to the sky like Simba, your eyes tearfully glazing over with joy. The other 364 days of the year, you will not encounter gluten-free labeling in the supermarket. There are a couple Japanese gluten-free activists that have started little personal shops in the far reaches of the city, and that will be the subject of a future post, but personally their existence has so far not impacted my life here very much.

As an aside, I cannot assure you that those rare instances of gluten-free labeling actually mean anything. The FDA has only recently defined American gluten-free labels to be officially <20 ppm and require such testing by law in order to use the label. To my knowledge, there is no such legislation in existence in Japan.

Do they label wheat? Yes and no. Yes, the government encourages food labeling for common allergens/irritants such as wheat, milk, egg, shrimp, and meats. No, it is not as helpful as it sounds. The problem with the system is that almost everything is labeled as containing wheat. This is due to a few key issues (two of these issues are actual problems with the food, the latter two might be better classified as attitude problems):

1. Wheat flour as a thickener is ubiquitous. It does not seem to have occurred to most companies yet to show mercy and just use potato starch, rice flower, etc.
2. Soy sauce, even if only trace amounts, is added to essentially every non-beverage liquid sold (sauces, dressings, etc). I have a theory that instead of adding salt, they add high-sodium soy sauce instead. Consider how much of your food contains salt, and imagine all of that salt contained gluten. That is Japan.
3. Companies are presumably liable if their food contains wheat but is not labeled as such. However, the reverse scenario is different: there is no risk for the company if they use a wheat label despite there actually being no wheat. Thus, there seems to be a trend for some companies, especially chain restaurants, to simply create their allergy list so that it literally has a dot next to wheat in every. single. column. I am not joking. It is easier than actually evaluating each item, contacting manufacturers, etc.
4. Some companies do not distinguish between the "ingredients contain wheat" and the "processed in a facility that also processes wheat" labels. They lump it all under something vague, like just the wheat symbol with a dot next to it. This is frustrating, because I suspect that something like 99% of the facilities here process wheat-containing products. Thus, "this item contains wheat" tends to be written on tons of products that actually probably do not contain wheat or gluten in any detectable amount. Many of us would be willing to risk the facility contamination, but we have no way of knowing if there's actually several grams of wheat flour hidden somewhere in the ingredients list or just the possibility of facility-related trace contamination. This is a really, really important distinction.

Do they label barley or rye? No. I have never, ever seen anything like "product contains barley" on a package. I have never seen these items on a restaurant's allergy listings. I am not sure most Japanese people even know what they are. This might be a good thing because I think it indicates that it is fairly rare in Japan to load up a meal with barley and rye products. I usually only see the symbols for those ingredients in the form of malt additives, alcohols, and vinegars. However, contamination is still a huge issue. For example, some miso soups are for some reason processed with large amounts of barley or wheat. The wheat contamination will be labeled, but the barley contamination will not. I could try to track down the manufacturer every time I drink miso soup, but I have found it simpler to just avoid miso altogether. Avoiding miso and soy sauce in Japan is an insane life, just FYI.

More on all this later! Bye for now ~