Food Label Rules Take Effect as Dietary Fat Dispute Is Unsettled

New rules take effect today for revising labels on virtually all packaged foods, but a dispute over fat content remains unresolved.

The Food and Drug Administration had insisted that labels show how much fat should be included in a daily diet, but the Agriculture Department opposed the idea.

Unable to reach a compromise Monday, the Bush Administration allowed proposals issued a year ago to take effect without refinements recommended by health officials and the food industry.

A senator who helped write the law requiring more extensive labeling blamed the meat industry for the impasse, saying it did not want the public to know how much fat is in meat.

But the American Meat Institute said his accusations were “flat-out wrong.”

The matter is not necessarily closed.

Although the White House, without comment, let the deadline for publishing the revisions in the Federal Register pass, food industry sources said the Administration would seek additional time to change the rules.

It is unclear whether changes can be made before Bush leaves office.

Heart disease and cancer have been linked to diets that contain too much fat, so information about it is considered key to the relabeling effort.

But a disagreement over how to present the information on labels developed between Agriculture Secretary Edward R. Madigan, whose department regulates meat, and Health and Human Services Secretary Louis W. Sullivan, who, along with Food and Drug Administration Commissioner David A. Kessler, created enforcement rules that emphasize health concerns.

Medical officials recommended that the chart break down cholesterol, fat, sodium and other nutrients as a percentage of daily nutritional needs.

Technically, the law applies only to non-meat foods, regulated by the FDA, but Madigan said last November that in the interest of uniformity, his department would join the relabeling effort.