Common food allergens

Priority allergens

Allergen Labelling

The Food and Drug Regulations require that most pre-packaged foods carry a label and that their ingredients appear in a list in decreasing order of proportion.

Health Canada has worked with the medical community, allergy associations, and the food industry to enhance labelling requirements for priority allergens, gluten sources and sulphite in pre-packaged foods sold in Canada. Canadian labelling regulations require that the most common food, and food ingredients which can cause life-threatening or severe allergic reactions, are always identified by their common names so that consumers can easily recognize them on food labels. For more details on Canada's food allergen labelling regulations, and other information on food allergen labelling, please see Health Canada's Allergen Labelling web page.

Allergen Research

Laboratory methods are required to detect undeclared allergens in food. In the early 1990's, Health Canada began a pioneering method development program, which resulted in methods for the detection of peanut, soy, milk, egg, hazelnut, Brazil nut, and crustaceans. These methods were transferred to CFIA laboratories for use in their compliance program with regards to the presence of undeclared allergens in foods. Find out more about Health Canada's food allergen research program.