Commitment to quality standards Food experts check infant formulas to verify compliance with safety and quality requirements

For more than 140 years, nutrition has been at the heart of Nestlé’s philosophy and research. Nestlé does its utmost to guarantee infants and young children a high-quality diet that meets their nutritional needs as closely as possible.

Since 1993, quality and safety have been incorporated within a programme – the "Nestlé Quality System" – covering all of the elements of the food chain, which involves:

Production based on strict regulatory framework

The regulations governing food for infants and young children – have been developed to ensure a level of nutritional content, safety and quality tailored to babies’ needs. In fact, regulations specific to foods for infants and young children come in addition to those for normal food and their raw ingredients.

Numerous bodies are involved in drawing up these regulations:

• On a global level, the World Health Organisation and the Food and Agriculture Organisation oversee the Codex Alimentarius bodies which set down agricultural and food standards.
• On a European level, the Commission of the European Communities, and in particular the Health and Consumer Protection Directorate General, relies on the expertise of the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA). Laws are adopted by the Member States of the Union on the Commission’s recommendation.

Rigorous selection and control of ingredients

Nestlé uses specifically chosen ingredients:

• Product quality specifically for infants: partner farmers undertake to use parcels of fields rigorously selected for growing raw materials intended for children’s food, far from all sources of pollution.
• Optimised taste and nutritional quality: fruit and vegetables are only used when they are ripe so as to benefit from their nutritional quality at its peak.
• 100% quality to trust: the use of preservatives and other additives is strictly regulated.
• High standards of traceability that can go back as far as the farmer, for some ingredients.
• Treatments are strictly limited* to a minimum: the use of pesticides and fertilisers such as nitrates is strictly controlled.

* In accordance with regulations

A wide range of safety and quality checks throughout production

Extremely rigorous checks are carried out at every stage of manufacture: more than 100 checks are carried out by batch from raw ingredients through to the finished products, including physical, chemical, microbiological and organoleptic (taste, texture, smell) checks.

Specially created recipes tailored to a baby’s needs as recognised in regulations

• Recipes with no added salt.
• A step-by-step introduction to foods, with a level of complexity of tastes given for the recipes, from extremely simple at the very beginning to the more complex for older infants.
• Textures that evolve according to babies’ abilities to chew (smooth texture at 6 months, slightly thicker at 7 months, introduction of very soft pieces of food at 8 months and introduction of small chewier pieces of food at 12 months).
• A discovery of tastes that is enriched at each stage and is based on cooking methods that preserve the flavour of food.

Clear information on packaging helps parents find the right products at the right time

Our products feature packaging that is specially designed to provide parents with complete information, so our products can meet their expectations and babies’ needs:

• “Stage” indicators on the face of each product, help indicate to parents the age from which this product is suitable for their baby.
• Provide a detailed list of ingredients*.
• Highlighting the nutritional values* of each product, by means of a clear nutritional table to reassure parents and delight baby in complete safety.
• Labelling of potentially allergenic ingredients* (gluten, eggs, milk, etc.).

* In accordance with regulations