The impact of pre-empting dual food quality regulation on product reformulation and packaging

• The occurrence of DC-SIP products has decreased. • The decrease is mostly driven by changes in front-of-pack. • Companies argue they can justify differences. The objective of this paper is to analyse the changes in the occurrence of the Differences in Composition of Seemingly Identical, branded food Products (DC-SIP) – also known as “dual food quality” – in the EU and the role of the Unfair Commercial Practices Directive (UCPD) in affecting the food industry’s packaging and recipe formulation choices of branded food products. The occurrence of DC-SIP has decreased from 31 % in 2018/2019 to 24 % in 2021. Our regression results show that companies are more likely to alter the front packaging rather than the composition of the products to address DC-SIP issues. The likelihood that changes in recipe reformulations and front packaging are introduced simultaneously is statistically significant but not all recipe reformulations are introduced jointly with changes in front packaging. Our results provide evidence that the UCPD regulation plays a role in companies reformulating recipes or/and changing the product packaging, but it is not a main driver. Companies often justify the composition differences in DC-SIP by differences in market conditions across Member States. The DC-SIP provisions in the UCPD give companies several options for addressing DC-SIP. For this reason, it is not a significant factor in impacting the companies' choices to reformulate or change the packaging of products.