As of 28 April 2015, sugar is removed from the list of permitted ingredients for fruit juices. It remains permissible in minimum quantities for nectars.
This is the result of changes to the Regulation on requirements for fruit drinks, which the government introduced into our national legislation the requirements of Directive 2012/12/EU on fruit juices and certain similar products intended for human consumption, the press service of the Cabinet announced.
The Directive is limited to fruit juices and nectars. It is not applicable to other beverages containing fruit juice or plant extracts. In that connection, the Decree replaces the collective term ‘fruit drinks’ by ‘fruit juices and fruit nectars’.
No sugar will be added to the juices and minimal amounts will be added to the nectars.
The regulation also distinguishes between juice from squeezed fruit and juice from concentrate. It includes tomatoes in the list of fruits used for the production of fruit juices and reduces the Brix scale values for certain fruits, i.e. the sugar content per unit of water solution. In addition, a requirement for product names to reflect the fruit presented in the list of ingredients is introduced.