Product of...Australia China?

My husband went nut shopping today at our favourite bulk nut (and previously Greek deli wholesale / retail, now Asian owned and run) shop. I’m vegetarian so my husband’s main source of protein is nuts. We buy them in kilo bags and unsalted as otherwise we find salted nuts inedibly too salty. He specially chose the ‘Product of Australia’ peanuts, only to arrive home and read the sticker on the back saying ‘Product of China’. So, the front of the package has a sticker saying "product of Australia’, and the back ‘Product of China’. Is this false advertising / labelling? He’s really annoyed but also not keen to do the hour round trip to demand his money back on the 4kg of peanuts he just bought.

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Hi @jc1,

To my understanding, you would be within your rights to ask for a refund in this case. Does the distributor have an email address or contact number to save you a trip? I’d suggest following it up with them first - if they value you as a customer, hopefully they’ll sort out the issue for you.

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Wonder if it is a store packed bag of bulk nuts…if it is could be the new owners of the store using old (previous owner’s) packaging to save money and reduce waste (not throwing them out which is a good thing)…but something which could be corrected by a permanent black marker crossing out the wrong one.

In any respects, confusing and poor labelling/attention to detail.

Agree with @BrendanMays about refund…however expect the price of 4kg nuts may be less than the cost to return.

Maybe call them to advise of the labelling problem, that you wish to return the packaging as it appears not to be the country of origin you wanted and also discuss returning them, if you chose to, when next in the shop locality.

They might also be able to confirm origin over the phone, but trusting what they say nay be another issue.

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I had the same problem with packaged nuts at a local food shop . The shop owner had a display of packaged nuts clearly stating " Product of Australia " on the front of the package . When you flipped the package around it said " Sourced from China " Vietnam , South Africa or whatever ./

I thought how stupid of me not to realise it’s the packaging that’s the product of Australia …Well at least I think it is .:scream:

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They might as well start labelling in hieroglyphics at this rate @vax2000.

@jc1 The country of origin labelling laws were updated recently, but it it isn’t mandatory until 2018. Still, if you have the time, it might be worth emailing the ACCC or pointing out the company so we can forward the info and address the dual labelling issue.

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From the ACCC

The Country of Origin Food Labelling Information Standard (link is external) (Standard) commenced on 1 July 2016. … Businesses have up to two years to transition to the labelling requirements set out in the Standard. During the transition period, businesses may either:
- voluntarily adopt the requirements of the Standard or
- continue to comply with the requirements around country of origin labelling set out in the Food Standards Code.

From 1 July 2018, businesses must comply with the Standard’s country of origin labelling requirements.

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Good point @PhilT. I’ll update my original post :slight_smile:

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Why is Australia so far behind in everything?
In Europe due to EU rules there are strict regulations regarding food labelling.
The work is already done Australia, all you have to do is follow the homework done by other countries in this area and put into place strict legislation about the food that consumers are purchasing (with their hard earned $$$) and let us be aware of exactly what we are putting in our mouths.

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Few other countries are as “considerate” of high business profits and minimising “red tape” as is Australia. Whether the LPA or ALP it is the same, just in slightly different degrees. Of course we have some nice window dressing such as the ACL, a toothless tiger excepting for companies voluntarily complying or the most egregious transgressions where there is no choice except to prosecute.

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Business in Aus. is so concerned with profit making and our ‘leaders’ appear so bedazzled with the promises of big $s… from a certain country, that apparently only those of us ‘in the streets’ can see what is really going on.
40 years ago we knew how products were grown up there, using raw unprocessed sewerage and it would appear that little has changed with many producers. Hygiene has never been a strong feature in either growing or packaging of certain products and yet we continue to import them. NZ used to import huge containers of veggies, relabel, and send them to Aus. Broccoli was a prime example.
Time to extract the digit, forget the promises/dreams of big free $s and grow and build our own everything.
Don’t think I would attempt another drive around Aus. in any new imported vehicle from …up there…
We did it all very well before yet now we seem to think that we are useless morons beholden to …guess who. Not good!
Marloo

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Looks like there have been over 5000 complaints to the ACCC over country of origin claims.

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@jc1 This store doesn’t happen to be in Melbourne, does it? It dounds exactly like a friend has described, and they live in Brunswick.

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Nope. It’s in Brisbane - West End. It seems a lot of especially Asian supermarkets are buying in bulk and doing their own packaging, which one would think, would make it easier to correctly label!

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yay.

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