The Watchdog Steps In: ACCC Opens Inquiry Into Food Labelling

A week and a half ago we wrote about the Four Corners investigation into food fraud, and the uncomfortable truth underneath it: a label is a claim, not a proof. This morning that story moved. Australia's consumer watchdog is now formally involved.

The ACCC has opened a preliminary investigation into allegations of misleading food labelling and packaging, prompted directly by the Four Corners findings, ABC News reported today.

What the testing actually found

Four Corners spent eight months on this, pulling together food import inspection records, national recalls, state regulatory records and international food fraud intelligence, then commissioning forensic lab testing of hundreds of everyday products. Among the results reported by the ABC:

• Dozens of tomato paste products labelled as Australian or Italian returned results consistent with Chinese-grown tomatoes, and about half of the failed products traced to Xinjiang, a region known for forced labour.
• Seafood promoted as Australian in the food services sector, including white fish and prawns, tested consistent with Vietnamese sourcing.
• Some eggs marketed as "cage-free" did not match that claim.
• Three brands of turmeric showed signs of adulteration, including lead chromate and iron oxide, which have no business being anywhere near food.

What happens now

The ACCC's job here is the consumer-law end: whether claims on labels, packaging and advertising are truthful and not misleading. Its commissioner made the point that shoppers often choose products on exactly these non-price claims, like where something comes from and how it was produced, which is why false ones matter.

Assistant Minister for Competition Andrew Leigh welcomed the move, putting it plainly: "Australians shouldn't be duped by misleading labels."

Worth knowing, because it explains why this took a television program to surface: responsibility for policing food in Australia is split across several bodies. FSANZ sets the standards, states and councils enforce them, the federal agriculture department checks imports, and the ACCC handles false claims under consumer law. Fraud lives in the gaps between them, the same gaps in the supply chain we wrote about last time.

The version of food shopping where none of this applies

We'll keep saying the quiet part: none of this is a problem you can solve by squinting harder at packaging. It's a problem of distance, of how many hands food passes through between whoever produced it and you.

Buying at the farm gate collapses that distance to a single handover. The person taking your money is the person who raised the hens, grew the tomatoes or cut the flowers, usually within a few kilometres of where you're standing. You can see the operation. You can ask how it's done. No inquiry required.

SideStall is a free app that maps the farm gates, roadside stalls and honesty boxes near you. Get it for iPhone or Android and see who's selling direct in your area.

And if you're a producer selling from your own gate: honesty about where food comes from is your home-ground advantage, and it has never been more topical. Listing your stall on SideStall is free to start, there's no monthly fee to take payments, and a small service fee applies only when a buyer pays through the app.

Source: ACCC launches inquiry into food labelling claims after Four Corners investigation, Samantha Dick, ABC News, 7 August 2026.