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Japan food label requirements: the Food Labeling Act and its standards

Food sold in Japan is labelled in Japanese under the Food Labeling Act (2015) and the Food Labeling Standards of the Consumer Affairs Agency. Most of the mandatory items go into one boxed panel (一括表示), and the pack also carries the recycling identification marks of the Act on the Promotion of Effective Utilization of Resources.

Checked: 29 October 2026

Mandatory items

The boxed panel

Name, ingredients and additives, origin of the main ingredient, net quantity, use-by or best-before date, storage, and the name and address of the business responsible sit together in a frame on the back or side, in type of at least 8 point (5.5 point on packs whose labelling area is 150 cm² or less). Imports add the country of origin and name the importer.

Allergens and nutrition

The specified allergens must always be declared; walnut became mandatory in 2023 and cashew moved to the mandatory list in April 2026 (with a transition period), and twenty further items are recommended. The nutrition panel gives energy, protein, fat, carbohydrate and salt equivalent; the 2025 nutrient reference values apply.

Recycling marks

Plastic and paper containers and packaging, PET bottles, steel and aluminium cans carry the identification mark of their material (識別マーク), at the size and in the place the ministries’ guidelines give, so households can sort them.

Why the rules look like this

Japanese labels are dense because Japanese shoppers read them, and because trust was broken more than once:

1. 2007 — famous confectioners are found re-dating returned sweets. Date fraud becomes a national story; the date on a Japanese pack is printed where it cannot be altered, never on a removable sticker.
2. 2015 — the Food Labeling Act merges three laws (the JAS Act, the Food Sanitation Act and the Health Promotion Act) into one standard, and makes nutrition labelling mandatory for processed food.
3. 2017–2022 — origin of the main ingredient becomes compulsory for all processed food made in Japan, after consumers asked where ingredients really came from.
4. 2023–2026 — walnut, then cashew, join the mandatory allergens as nut allergies in children rise. The allergen list is the part of a Japanese label that changes most; design the ingredients block to grow.
5. Food loss — to waste less, products that keep over three months may show the best-before date as year and month only. A shorter date field is allowed, not required.

Seasons that sell packs

Two gift seasons drive Japanese packaging: ochūgen in summer and oseibo in December, when department stores sell boxed sets wrapped with noshi paper. The noshi is custom, not law, but each product inside still needs its full label. Valentine’s Day, when women give chocolate, and White Day on 14 March, when it is returned, fill February and March; omiyage — regional sweets brought back from travel — make individually wrapped pieces with their own labels a standard format.

Who answers for the label

The food business named as responsible for the label (表示責任者) — maker, seller or importer — and, for criminal offences, both the person who acted and the company.

The designer and the printer are not named by these laws — but a contract can make them pay for the reprint. Keep the client’s written approval of the final copy; Drint’s review link records it.

If the label is wrong

Under the Food Labeling Act, authorities first instruct, then order the business to correct the label, and publish its name — in Japan the published name does more damage than the fine. Ignoring an order, or a false origin, is a crime: for origin fraud up to two years in prison or two million yen, and up to 100 million yen for a company; for labels that put health at risk, such as a missing allergen, heavier penalties apply. Since June 2021 every recall over a label error must be reported to the authorities, and the list is public.

Who else loses, beyond the fine

A wrong label costs more than its fine, and the cost travels down the chain:

1. The shopper — an undeclared allergen can put someone in hospital; that is why recalls for allergens move fastest.
2. The brand — a recall notice with its name stays online for years, and retailers may delist the product.
3. The importer and distributor — stock held at the port or in a warehouse, storage fees, relabelling labour, sometimes a whole container sent back.
4. The shop — products immobilised or pulled from shelves in the middle of a season.
5. The printer — a reprint at its own cost if the contract says so, and a lost client either way.
6. The designer — the reprint blamed on the artwork, unless the client’s approval is on record.

The order inside the boxed panel

The panel reads, in this order: name, ingredients, additives (separated from the ingredients by a slash or their own line), net quantity, use-by or best-before date, storage method, country of origin (imports), and the business responsible. Allergens are shown either after each ingredient or together at the end of the ingredients, as “（一部に小麦・卵・乳成分を含む）”. The nutrition panel sits outside or below the box.

Use-by (消費期限) is for food that spoils within about five days, such as bento and fresh confectionery; everything else uses best-before (賞味期限).

Mistakes, and a check before printing

The usual problems: best-before used on food that needs a use-by date; additives mixed into the ingredients with no division; ingredient origin left out on processed food made in Japan; recycling marks missing on the plastic film or the paper sleeve.

1. Set the boxed panel in the order above, at 8 point or more.
2. Separate additives and declare all specified allergens, cashew included.
3. Write the origin of the heaviest ingredient for food made in Japan.
4. Add the nutrition panel with salt equivalent, not sodium alone.
5. Put a 識別マーク on each material: プラ, 紙, PET, スチール, アルミ.

Cosmetics and household goods

Cosmetics follow the Pharmaceutical and Medical Device Act (薬機法): the pack lists every ingredient (全成分表示), the name and address of the marketing authorisation holder (製造販売業者), the product name, the lot number, the contents and, for products whose quality changes within three years, the expiry date — all in Japanese. Textiles, plastic wares, electrical appliances and other goods on the list of the Household Goods Quality Labeling Act carry a quality label with the materials, care and the name of the labeller; electrical goods add the PSE mark where the Electrical Appliances and Materials Safety Act asks.

Worked example: a 200 g box of butter cookies

Made in Vietnam and sold in Japan, the pack reads, line by line (the client’s own names and numbers replace those in brackets):

1. 名称：ビスケット
2. 原材料名：小麦粉、バター、砂糖、鶏卵、食塩／膨張剤、（一部に小麦・卵・乳成分を含む）
3. 内容量：200g
4. 賞味期限：箱底面に記載
5. 保存方法：直射日光、高温多湿を避けて保存してください。
6. 原産国名：ベトナム
7. 輸入者：[名称]　[住所]
8. 栄養成分表示（100gあたり）：熱量 [ ] kcal・たんぱく質 [ ] g・脂質 [ ] g・炭水化物 [ ] g・食塩相当量 [ ] g（推定値）

Why it reads this way

Cookies keep for months, so the date is best-before (賞味期限); the slash divides ingredients from the additive; imported, so no ingredient origin but the country of origin and the importer.

How Drint helps

Three kinds of people make packs for Japan with Drint, and each needs something different:

Free, no account: the barcode generator, the mm to inches converter and the paper sizes table.

1. A business with its own brand — Drint has no label kit for Japan yet, so the checklist on this page is your check before export. See the pack in 3D before it is printed, send the design to the person who must approve it with a review link, and hand the printer one CMYK PDF/X-4 with the die on its own layer, so nobody retypes the label.
2. A household business — start from a ready dieline cut to your exact box or bag size instead of paying for a die drawing, use your own photos on 3D mockups for your online shop, and keep the mandatory text exactly as you wrote it: Drint never translates or rewords a client’s copy.
3. A designer — lay out several markets from one design, each with its own language and items, keep every client’s approvals in one place, and show finished packs on a portfolio page at drint.io/your-name.

Laying it out in Drint

1. Drint has no label kit for Japan yet: add a text block for each item of the table above, in the order the law lists them.
2. Paste the client’s copy as they wrote it — Drint does not translate or reword it.
3. Place official marks (symbols, numbers, logos) from the authority’s own files at their stated size; export the CMYK PDF/X-4 with the die on its own layer for your printer.

Official sources

1. 消費者庁 食品表示企画
2. e-Gov法令検索（食品表示基準）
3. 経済産業省 3R政策（識別表示）

Drint checks this label while you design, for 47 countries: see how the label-law check works.

Lay out the label in Drint

Questions

A summary written to design packs, not legal advice. Check the Food Labeling Standards and the Consumer Affairs Agency’s Q&A for your food category, and the identification-mark guidelines, before printing.