Posts about reselling health functional foods, such as red ginseng, deer antler, and probiotics received as gifts during the Lunar New Year holiday, are rapidly appearing on online second-hand transaction platforms. Since May of last year, the Ministry of Food and Drug Safety (MFDS) has introduced a pilot project for the resale of health functional foods among individuals for a one-year period.
Although the project has been ongoing for over eight months, cases of violations of transaction regulations have been consistently reported. With about four months remaining until the end of the MFDS pilot project, there is growing interest in whether the resale of health functional foods will become institutionalized.
As of the 29th, various posts about the resale of health functional foods, including red ginseng, deer antler, probiotics, and supplements, are flooding platforms like carrot and Lightning Market. Both carrot and Lightning Market are platforms where the MFDS has permitted individual transactions of health functional foods. As the pilot operation of the project has progressed, a separate category for "health functional foods" has been created on carrot, and a category for "health functional foods (MFDS pilot project)" has been added on Lightning Market.
According to the MFDS, products eligible for resale as health functional foods include ▲ unopened products ▲ products with at least six months left before the expiry date ▲ products with product names and health functional food labels ▲ products that are not direct purchases or purchase agency items from overseas ▲ items that can be stored at room temperature or ambient temperatures. The number of individual transactions is also limited to 10 times per year, and the cumulative transaction amount is set at 300,000 won or less.
However, many posts on the second-hand transaction platforms that do not comply with the MFDS guidelines have been posted. A typical example is posting for sale in a different category despite the existence of a "health functional foods" category. On carrot and Lightning Market, when selling health functional foods, essential information such as the expiration date must be entered to post; however, other categories do not have such requirements, allowing posts to be made without essential information like the expiration date.
In particular, some posts that were reposted thinking of reselling products received as gifts during last year's Chuseok holiday did not accurately state the expiration dates of the products. Furthermore, it should be noted that photos must be taken to verify whether the expiration date of the products to be resold matches, but all that was mentioned in the posts were terms like "until 2026" or "until 2027."
There were also instances where posts included screenshots from online sales instead of actual product photos. The posts merely claimed that the products are the same as those sold on e-commerce platforms like Coupang or Naver, thus making it impossible to verify the condition or expiration dates of the actual products. Additionally, confirming the number of individual transactions and sales amounts was difficult. While the MFDS has set limits for individual transaction counts to 10 times and the transaction amount to 300,000 won, it is practically impossible to ascertain accurate transaction counts and amounts if multiple health functional foods are sold in a single post.
The MFDS plans to decide whether to extend or discontinue the pilot project for the resale of health functional foods among individuals after it concludes. An MFDS official noted, "The pilot project will end in May this year," and added, "We will analyze the data results, including the sales posts accumulated on carrot and Lightning Market, and then determine the direction of the project."
There are doubts within the industry about whether the resale of health functional foods among individuals will become institutionalized. An industry official said, "We have conducted the project for nearly eight months with only two of numerous second-hand transaction platforms, yet posts violating regulations are still rampant," adding, "Unless additional measures are taken to ensure compliance with the regulations, institutionalization will be difficult." Another official remarked, "For the remaining period, it will be essential for platforms and the government to filter and penalize posts that violate regulations through effective monitoring to possibly extend the pilot project."