Three colour additive petitions landed in the same morning's Federal Register, and two of them ask for 37 food categories between them
Sponge cake. Wasabi paste. Syrup for shaved ice. Creamers and whiteners.
Those are four of the twenty numbered food categories in a petition the Food and Drug Administration has filed on behalf of the Gardenia Blue Interest Group, which wants the approved uses of gardenia genipin blue expanded. The petition is CAP 6C0343 and it was filed on 4 August. It also asks the agency to tighten the arsenic specification for the colour, from no more than 2 milligrams per kilogram to no more than 1.
A second petition, from GNT USA, LLC, asks for safflower extract to be approved as a colour additive in seventeen categories. Those run from tortilla wraps and alcoholic beverages through pickled jalapenos and banana pepper rings to ready-to-use chicken and vegetable broth. It is CAP 5C0338 and it was filed on 20 July.
The same address on two of them
Both of those petitions were submitted care of Exponent, Inc., at 1150 Connecticut Avenue NW, Suite 1100, Washington. The consultancy is not the petitioner in either case and does not become one by filing. It is worth noticing anyway, because it puts two of the three petitions in this issue through one consultancy on one floor of one building.
The third one is about a solvent, not a colour
The International Association of Color Manufacturers has asked for something narrower and more technical: permission to use acetone as a solvent in the manufacture of carrot oil, plus heavy metal limits and secondary names for the substance. That petition is docketed as FDA-2026-C-8883 and was filed on 3 August.
It is also the only one of the three with a date on it for the public. Comments on the petitioner's environmental assessment are due by 18 September, and the notice says late filings will not be considered. The other two petitioners claim a categorical exclusion under 21 CFR 25.32(k), on the ground that what they are asking for would authorise a substance meant to stay in food and eaten, and is not meant to replace a macronutrient. If FDA accepts that, no environmental assessment is required and there is nothing to comment on at this stage.
What a filing notice is and is not
Filing is an administrative step under section 721(d)(1) of the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act. It means the agency has accepted the petition for review. It does not mean any of these colours or solvents has been approved for any of these foods, and the notices say the agency may also consider other changes to the regulations as the review goes on.
