IBFAN in the
Codex Alimentarius

Codex is a joint United Nations body created in 1963 by the World Health Organisation (WHO) and the FAO to develop food standards, guidelines and codes of practice under the Joint FAO/WHO Food Standards Programme.  IBFAN has been attending Codex meetings since 1995 when the World Trade Organisation (WTO) was established and was mandated  to refer to Codex Standards in trade disputes. Overall, Codex has had a damaging influence on the protection of breastfeeding and child health. The lack of transparency and poor conflict of interest safeguards,  coupled with the dominance of food corporations and powerful exporting nations, has led to Codex adopting weak standards for many harmful foods and commodities. These standards have been regularly used in attempts to stop governments bringing in strong marketing controls. with interventions made at the WTO concerning commercial milk formula marketing, labelling or safety testing regulations of another member state, wrongly treating Codex standards as a ‘regulatory ceiling’ for trade purposes.  In fact,  governments have the sovereign right to adopt any legislation they consider necessary to protect child health as long as it does not violate international trade principles,

Largely because of IBFAN’s consistent advocacy at Codex, the standards on foods for infants and young children adopted after 1995,  all refer in some way to the International Code, the Global Strategy and/or the subsequent WHA Resolutions on infant and young child feeding and the Codex Code of Ethics for International Trade continues to require Member States to “…make sure that the international code of marketing of breast milk substitutes and relevant resolutions of the World Health Assembly (WHA) setting forth principles for the protection and promotion of breastfeeding be observed.”