Revisão com o objetivo de analisar e comparar a legislação brasileira, nos aspectos de desenvolvimento, avaliação e comercialização dos alimentos funcionais, com a legislação dos países: Austrália, Canadá, Estados Unidos, Japão; da União Européia e a opinião do Codex Alimentarius. Separou-se e analisou-se a legislação desses alimentos em cinco partes: a) Definição legal; b) Regulamentação; c) Alegações; d) Procedimentos de comunicação das alegações; e) Critérios de avaliação da segurança e eficácia desses alimentos. Constatou-se que, dos países analisados, somente o Japão possui uma definição legal e uma regulamentação própria para essa categoria de produto e que o Canadá é o único país que apresenta uma norma clara e objetiva sobre a divulgação, nos meios de comunicação, dos alimentos com alegações. Verificou-se que existem diferentes tipos de definições e usos para as alegações, sendo algumas vezes equivalentes entre os países e outras não. Constatou-se que todos os países em estudo compartilham de alguns pontos comuns quanto aos critérios de avaliação, como: as alegações devem ser baseadas em estudos científicos relevantes; e o produto deve ser seguro sem a necessidade de supervisão médica. A Austrália, o Canadá, os Estados Unidos, a União Européia e o Reino Unido dispõem de guias de orientações bem explicativos sobre como as alegações devem ser avaliadas. Levando-se em conta as orientações fornecidas por esses documentos, elaborou-se uma sugestão de guia sobre os procedimentos/passos para se avaliar a segurança e a veracidade de uma alegação. / This is a review with the aim of analyzing and comparing Brazilian legislation relating to aspects of the development, evaluation and commercialization of functional foods, with that of Australia, Canada, the United States of America, Japan, and the European Union, and with the opinions expressed in the Codex Alimentarius. This food legislation was separated and analyzed in five distinct parts: a) The legal definition; b) Regulations; c) Claims; d) Procedures for communicating claims; and) Criteria for evaluating the security and effective of these foods. It was noticed that from all the analysed countries, only Japan has a legal definition and a regulation that fits sort of product and that Canada is the only country that has an objective and unambiguous norm on divulging the nutriments with claims among communication. With regard to claims, it was noticed that there are different types of definition and uses that sometimes have counterparts in other countries and sometimes not. In the part dealing with the evaluation criteria of these foods, it was noticed that all countries in the study have some points in common. Among these points are that the claims must be based on relevant scientific studies and that the product must be safe without the need for medical supervision. Australia, Canada, the United States, the European Union and the United Kingdom have very explicit guidelines regarding how the claims should be evaluated. Taking into consideration the guidelines supplied in these documents it was prepared a suggested guide for procedures/steps for evaluating the security and truth of the claims.

In the Czech Republic the food production is one of the most important branches of processing industry. The effort of producers, distributors and inspecting authorities is to limit the production of insanitary products as much as possible. That?s why there are a lot of inspecting mechanisms within the Czech Republic and also within the whole European Union. Their major aim is to reveal these insanitary and deceptively marked products and withdraw them from circulation. The requirements for marking of products aren?t simply and completely clearly defined even today, after the progressive harmonization with the prescriptions of the European Union. Concrete requirements for marking of foodstuff can be found in the Food Act No. 110/1997 Coll. and its implementing decrees including a special decree about the forms of marking of foodstuff No. 113/2005 Coll. Specific demands for marking of individual groups of products are given in decrees for particular commodities. It isn?t easy to draw up a comprehensive picture of all requirements for marking of a concrete product. In order to use the text on the cover, the consumer needs to know what?s hiding under certain words and what do the individual marks on the cover mean. The aim of the diploma thesis was to judge the compliance of legislation for marking of selected food products ? meat products, dairy products, spices and spice mixtures. The acquired information have been compared with a questionnaire research among consumers. It was an important finding that almost three quarters of respondents never had to reclaim a deceptively marked product. Unfortunately, 26.25 % of respondents met a deceptively marked product and that?s why they reclaimed it. In most cases the claim has been delt by repaying or exchange of goods; unfortunately, the claim of 9.5 % respondents hasn?t been accepted.

This thesis presents an overview of school dinner (food) in the Czech Republic, Austria and selected states in Europe. In the theoretical part, it is described how the state school board works in the particular country. Food history, quality and scope together with legislation and economical aspects are described, too. In the practical part, results of questionnaire survey are interpreted with a focus on requests of dinners in particular categories. In addition, how diners are satisfied with food offers and healthy food used in canteens is shown in the result part. The presented analysis is a part of the UMBESA project, which promotes an increase of biofood, regional, seasonal and freshly prepared food in catering systems. This part further contains results - summary and recommendations.