Gloria Takes Peruvian Milk Labelling Dispute to Constitutional Court
Peru’s Constitutional Court will decide Leche Gloria S.A.’s challenge to Supreme Decree 004-2022-MIDAGRI, which changed the rules governing the production and labelling of evaporated milk. The case has been transferred to the court’s full bench, giving it responsibility for the final ruling on the dispute.
The decree, which has been in force since October 2022, defines evaporated milk as a product made by removing part of the water from milk. This differs from a reconstituted product, which begins with a concentrated or dehydrated form and later has water added to restore particular characteristics. Under the revised rules, those distinctions must also be reflected in the name displayed on packaging.
The change affected Gloria’s long-established blue-label product. Since October 2022, the company has sold that presentation as reconstituted milk rather than evaporated milk. Gloria also introduced a purple-label product marketed as evaporated milk.
The National Association of Consumers and Users, known by its Spanish initials AINCUS, says the former formulation used powdered milk and therefore no longer met the revised requirements for the evaporated-milk designation. AINCUS has also questioned the formulation of the product currently sold under that category. Those statements represent the organisation’s position in the dispute and are not a finding by the Constitutional Court.
Gloria argues that the decree infringes constitutional rights and has asked the courts to invalidate it. During the proceedings, the company sought an interim measure that would have allowed it to continue selling the former presentation while the main challenge was considered. The request was rejected, and the amended rules remained in effect.
The case also refers to the Codex Alimentarius, the international collection of food standards. Its framework includes the concept of protected dairy terms, under which product names are expected to correspond to an item’s nature and composition and not mislead consumers. AINCUS argues that Peru’s rules follow this approach by requiring evaporated milk to be produced directly from milk through partial water removal.
The dispute follows earlier arguments in Peru over dairy composition and labelling, including the controversy surrounding Pura Vida in 2017. That episode prompted broader discussion of the information presented to consumers and of which products could be sold using names associated with milk. The 2022 decree formed part of the subsequent revision of Peru’s dairy-market rules.
The proceedings involve more than the name used on Gloria’s packaging. The rules on powdered milk may affect demand for domestically produced fresh milk, industrial costs, imports and the formulations available to consumers. The Constitutional Court is to determine whether the challenged regulation can remain in force in light of Gloria’s constitutional arguments and how the rules should define the ingredients and processes that permit use of the term “evaporated milk”.
