APPENDIX VI
GENERAL PRINCIPLES FOR THE USE OF FOOD ADDITIVES

1. The use of food additives is justified only when it serves one or more of the following purposes:

   1. to maintain the nutritional quality of a food;
   2. to enhance the keeping quality or stability of a food;
   3. to make a food attractive to the consumer;
   4. to provide aids in producing, manufacturing, packing, processing, preparing, treating, packaging, transporting or holding food;
   5. to provide essential components for foods for special dietary uses.

   The use of food additives is not justified:

   6. if the proposed level of use constitutes a hazard to the health of the consumer;
   7. when it causes a substantial reduction in the nutritive value of a food;
   8. when it disguises the faulty qualities of a product or the the use of processing and handling techniques which are not permitted;
   9. when it deceives the consumer;
   10. when the desired effect can be obtained by other manufacturing practices which are economically and technologically satisfactory.

2. The levels of use of food additives should not exceed the level reasonably required to achieve the desired technological effect under good manufacturing practice.

3. Food additives should be in conformity with an approved standard of purity.

4. 1. All food additives, whether actually in use or being proposed for future use, should be subjected to adequate toxicological evaluation.

   2. Permitted food additives should be subject to continuing observation for possible deleterious effects and should be re-appraised whenever necessary in the light of changing conditions of use and new scientific information.

5. Approval of temporary approval for the inclusion of a food additive in a permitted list should, as far as possible, be limited to specific foods for specific purposes and under specific conditions.

6. When a food containing additives is consumed mainly by some special groups in the community, the approval to use the additives should be based on knowledge of the intake by such special groups concerning the food in question.

7. Contaminants must not exceed levels that are both safe and technologically feasible.