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A range of international experts, including from the Development Law Service, LEGN, met on 21st March 2024at the Harvard Food Law and Policy Clinic to discuss “Edible Internet: How Food E-Commerce is Shifting Regulatory Appetites Globally” and recent trends on food e-commerce.  

Mr T. Viinikainen, LEGN, was the FAO panellist and he shared FAO insights on the current state of regulatory attention given to food e-commerce based on LEGN's research in this area.  The panel was complemented by the participation of Dr. Pinghui Xiao, Harvard Law School Food Law and Policy Clinic Visiting Scholar and Senior Lecturer at Guangzhou University, as well as MJ Plana Casado, PhD, the author of  “E-food: Closing the Online Enforcement Gap in the EU Platform Economy”. 

A lively discussion explored the evolving food e-commerce landscape and showcased how governments and international organizations around the world have, or have not, chosen to approach and regulate it. FAo noted that most jurisdictions so far have not adopted specific legislation on food e-commerce but are rather relying on existing food safety, consumer protection and general e-commerce legislation to address this relatively new phenomenon. FAO also highlighted that such an approach may have its limitations and gave an overview of Key regulatory areas that are connected with the specificities of e-commerce of food, and which may require regulatory attention. These include the new roles and liabilities of online actors, the ways in which food information needs to be shown in a digital environment, the shortcomings of consumer protection rules for distance sales of food products, the need for re-thinking the role of public authorities and the importance of self- and co-regulation. 

All these topics and more will be discussed in detail in the upcoming publication “Regulatory options to address food e-commerce in national legislation: policy and legal challenges”, which will soon be published by LEGN and will be available at: https://www.fao.org/legal-services/publications/library/en/