Like the country song “God is great, Beer is good and People are crazy”…now the FDA is weighing in on one of these…that would be the beer.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration is now involved in how makers of non-malted beers, containing substitutes for that barley, must now label these products.

Previously, these beers were governed by the TTB, Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau. This bureau made a ruling in 2008 that beers made with malted barley substitutes are not under their authority.

Without the malt ingredient, this product no longer meets the definition of a malted beverage. Basically, a malt beverage is a definitional term used for alcoholic and non-alcoholic fermented beverages where the primary ingredient is barley. Some of these non-malted substitutes are sorghum, rice, wheat or a “hops free” process.

Now, these beers are subject to the labeling requirements under the Federal Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act and the Fair Packaging and labeling Act. Currently, the FDA regulates all the labeling of wine that contains less than 7 percent alcohol by volume, such as wine coolers, cooking wine, and ciders.

With this new guidance, which is called “Labeling of Certain Beers Subject to the labeling Jurisdiction of the Food and Drug Administration”, these labels must adhere to listing ingredients in the product, have a nutrition facts panel and name any major food allergen presence.

This is great news for the large population of consumers suffering from gluten intolerance or Celiac Disease, which is estimated to affect at least 1 in 133 Americans.

Paul Gatza of the Brewers Association in Boulder, Colorado is quoted as saying, “Gluten-free beer makes up less than 0.1% of the beer market. The biggest players in the gluten-free beer market are Anheuser-Busch's Red Bridge, Klisch's Lakefront in Milwaukee, Wisconsin and Bard's Tale from Connecticut”.

The Gluten-Free food industry has seen annual growth rates around 28% in the years between 2004 and 2008, with sales close to $ 1.5 billion. Estimates out there put these sales at $2.6 billion by 2012. With this new beer market emerging, these numbers might go higher.

For the current and future non-malt beer manufacturers, they will be expected to comply with the labeling requirements by Jan. 1, 2012.

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