May 6, 2020

The Mexican government has published the draft cheese conformity assessment procedure related to the new compositional technical regulation issued for cheese last year, NOM-223-SCFI/SAGARPA-2018 (NOM-223) (see earlier Hot Topic). The draft cheese conformity assessment was posted to the Diario Oficial (DOF) on May 4, 2020 and from now on, the 60-day public consultation period is open until Friday July 03, 2020. An unofficial English translation of the draft conformity assessment procedure for cheese is available here.

USDEC will be developing comments to the draft conformity assessment procedure and welcomes member feedback by May 22, 2020 on the following points:

• An estimate of the cost of the current proposal (lot by lot testing, noting that only ISO and NMX methods are currently accepted);
• Additional test methods you would like to see approved for fat, moisture, protein, and fatty acid profile, and
• Alternative proposals for conformity assessment

Below is a summary of the draft cheese conformity assessment proposal. The cheese conformity assessment will require manufacturers to prove compliance with two parts of the draft cheese regulation:

1. Permitted ingredients: Article 5.1.1 of NOM-223 allows up to 2% casein, caseinate, or milk protein concentrate in cheese. Article 4.2.4 of the draft conformity assessment procedure requires companies utilizing any of these three ingredients to complete the declaration in Appendix A and send it through SINEC, a portal of the Ministry of Economy.
2. Specifications: The draft conformity assessment procedure requires confirmation that the cheese meets the specifications in Table 2 of NOM-223. For imported products, conformity will be assessed according to the articles in sections 4.2. and 4.4

NOTE: as proposed, the current draft conformity assessment procedure treats domestic and imported cheese differently. Domestic manufacturers are only required to provide test reports to the Mexican government two times per year, but imports are required to provide test reports for each lot.

Please send all comments to Oscar Ferrara at oferrara@usdec.org.