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Drinkers face higher prices if local brewers are forced to put labels on their cans and bottles warning pregnant women of the risks of drinking alcohol, brewers say.
The liquor industry on both sides of the Tasman has lined up solidly against an application to the joint regulatory body Food Standards Australia New Zealand (FSANZ) to require warning labels on all alcohol sold in Australasia, matching a law that has applied in the United States since 1989.
But the medical profession, which has previously regarded "moderate" drinking during pregnancy as safe, has now lined up equally solidly to advise pregnant women not to drink at all, and to support warning labels.
FSANZ spokeswoman Lydia Buchtmann said the Canberra-based agency had received more than 90 submissions on the application, which was lodged by New Zealand's Alcohol Advisory Council.
The agency will release a draft report mid-year, either detailing proposed labelling requirements or rejecting the application.
A final report is likely to go to New Zealand and Australian federal and state food ministers early next year.
Lion Nathan corporate affairs director Liz Read said compulsory labelling would cost the New Zealand liquor industry $10 million for set-up costs in the first year and $8 to $10 million a year after that.
"We would need to pass those costs on to consumers," she said.
"A food standard applies to primary and secondary packaging - not just bottles and cans, but outer packaging.
"In the case of our brands, a lot don't have labels on the back of the bottles and there just isn't room on the front for a warning to be introduced, so we would need to introduce back labels. That significantly slows down production lines and increases your production costs."
But the Ministry of Health, in a submission supporting labels, said it would be happy for liquor prices to rise.
New Zealanders spent $1.2 billion last year on retail purchases of liquor, plus $1.1 billion at bars and clubs and $3.8 billion in cafes and restaurants, where liquor accounts for much of the trade.
Adding $10 million a year to those figures would add 0.8 per cent to retail purchases alone, but only about 0.3 per cent if the cost was spread across retailing, bars and an assumed 25 per cent of restaurant business.
The Paediatric Society, the Royal NZ College of General Practitioners and the NZ College of Midwives have all lodged submissions supporting the labelling proposal.
Paediatric Society president Dr Rosie Marks said drinking at any time during pregnancy was "unwise", especially during the first trimester when all the baby's organs were being formed.
"There is a huge amount of debate about whether health warnings work or not, but it does seem to me that if you want to get the message to the group of people drinking most often, then to put it on the product will get it in front of them," she said.
The Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists has not made a submission on the proposal, but a New Zealand member of its health committee, Dr Digby Ngan Kee, said he would personally support a warning statement such as "Alcohol can harm your unborn baby".
He said his committee was drafting a new statement on alcohol which would aim to give clear advice without scaring women into seeking abortions if they realised that they had drunk before they knew they were pregnant.
NZ Medical Association maternity spokesman Dr Mark Peterson said his group did not have a policy on labelling but did have a consensus view that, as there was no known safe level of drinking during pregnancy, pregnant women should not drink at all.
