Laboratory managers can choose between plate-based reference methods or proprietary methods. Faster but often more expensive, how can we be sure proprietary methods meet or exceed reference method performance?IntroductionAnalytical methods and their performance parameters have been defined as one of the components of a microbiological criterion for [...]

A complex interrelationship of global, regional, national, and private trade and analytical standards for olive oil and olive oil grading provides assurance at every step from tree to consumer. IntroductionOlive oil is an ancient food oil with a long history and current prominence in dietary approaches based on traditional Mediterranean eating hab [...]

The list of regulated chemical substances is different, the maxium allowed concentrations are sometimes different and in each country or Federation there are often changes in the regulation. In a few cases such differences can represent a trade barrier.Abbreviations:Codex • Codex Alimentarius CommissionCU • Customs UnionML • Maximum LevelMRL [...]

Digital communication technologies have tremendous potential to facilitate effective risk communication about existing and emerging food safety threats. However, some caution regarding social exclusion and ethical issues is needed. The need for effective risk benefit communication Effective risk communication about food issues is important from t [...]

China and Russia are on a fast track to ramp up food trade, but several food safety issues must be solved first.Russia is eager to partially replace US products in the Chinese food market, but ongoing food safety disagreements remain a stumbling block for export growth. During the first ten months of 2020, Russia exported 3.7 million tonnes of foo [...]

How Neotron, a prominent Italian food testing laboratory, is becoming part of the growth strategy of the Swiss inspection and certification company.Cotecna Inspection SAFounded: 1974Present in: 50 countriesNumber of Laboratories/offices: 160Revenue: not providedEmployees: over 5 000Neotron SPAFounded: 1976Location: Modena, ItalyRevenue: not provide [...]

Simple devices that can be operated by non-laboratory staff are sufficiently accurate for identifying suspected non-compliant food batches. This kind of smart sampling can replace random sampling and make way for more efficient food fraud and safety controls.The food industry goes to great lengths to ensure the safety and quality of products on sto [...]

Do method sensitivities comply with recommended allergen reference doses? The ThRAll-EFSA project is developing a tool to quantify allergens in complex foods using MS techniques for improved analytical accuracy.The size of the food allergy problemFood allergies are a growing health burden worldwide. Although the true prevalence of food allergies is [...]

No topic dominated the media in 2020 like the COVID-19 pandemic.After endless deliberation over infec- tion counts and challenges to national health systems, public debate turned to controversial government-mandated containment measures to reduce COV- ID-19 transmission, such as wearing face masks, social distancing, and curfews. But for those resp [...]

Spotlight on a young, fast-growing network: Tentamus Group.TENTAMUS GROUP KEY FIGURESENTAMUS GROUP KEY FIGURESFounded in: 2011Present in: 19 countriesNumber of laboratories: more than 65Revenues (2019): not providedEmployees: 3 000Food companies outsource most of their analytical controls. Apart from antibiotics in milk and mycotoxins in grains (da [...]

The complexities of food fraud require an understanding of criminology to remove incentives for criminals and to create more resilient food supply chains. IntroductionToday, food fraud is regarded mainly as a food regulatory/quality issue and it is addressed with the typical approach well known to the food business: risk analysis followed by mitig [...]

The second quarter of 2020 saw a drop in RASFF notifications, a plausible consequence of the pandemic measures, but has the anticipated increase in food fraud actually occurred?It is hard to think of another event that has had such far-reaching effects in such a short period of time as the COVID-19 pandemic. We have been witness to substantial chan [...]

Despite tightened sanitary controls, sausage and processed meat containing African swine fever virus (ASF) are still found in Russia and some of its neighboring countries. On August 18, a routine inspection by the Russian veterinary watchdog Rosselkhoznadzor revealed the presence of the ASF genome in sausage products manufactured by a meat pro [...]

Analytical science, both in chemistry and microbiology, has seen a drastic technical evolution in recent years. It’s possible to test for analytes with very little knowledge about them. And this is where things start to get difficult. Just because one can test for something, should one test for it? And why? Which actions, if any, should be taken [...]

Is it possible for valorised food processing by-products to be both safe and sustainable? The European Commission’s aspiration to move towards a circular economy is no secret. With the recent unveiling of the Green Deal, an ambitious plan to make Europe carbon neutral by 2050, it is clear that in the near future, businesses will be expected [...]

Recommendations to facilitate the adoption of non-targeted mass spectrometry-based methods in food authenticity assessments. IntroductionFood authenticity is one of the major concerns of producers, consumers, and regulators. Today it is important to verify that food package labelling corresponds to the actual characteristics of the food. For e [...]

Testing food manufacturing surfaces for SARS-CoV-2 has been widely promoted during the pandemic but is this approach effective for decreasing virus transmission of the virus?IntroductionCOVID-19 is not considered a foodborne illness and surface contamination is not likely a significant source of contamination. Yet, food industry players are encoura [...]

While consumers around the globe have gradually lost trust in poorly-applied precautionary allergen labelling (PAL) schemes, the UK food industry appears to be willing to embrace the new allergen approach utilising allergen thresholds. IntroductionFood allergies are a significant problem, with an estimated 20 million sufferers in Europe alone, [...]

Alongside other current industrial approaches, next-generation sequencing (NGS) plays an important role in addressing food fraud and ensuring food authenticity.IntroductionNext-generation sequencing (NGS) has been primarily associated with work in academia and work in human health-related fields. The insulation of NGS within these fields has been a [...]

AbstractWith the comprehensive legislation in many countries and co-existence of mycotoxins in different agricultural commodities and foods, as well as large monitoring and risk assessment programs related to these compounds, finding rapid, easy-to-use, accurate, and cost-effective solutions for multi-mycotoxin detection is of high demand. Therefor [...]

We now know that we live our whole lives under a rain of hazardous chemicals. But there is a period in our lives when this exposure can create even more problems. It is when we are developing in our mothers’ wombs and when we are breastfeeding. Not only can our development be hindered but that exposure can increase the probability that we will co [...]

Are regulatory limits a good compromise between public health and economic interests?The EU undoubtedly has the strictest mycotoxin regulations in the world. The complex and supposedly well-structured system that enforces these regulations and guarantees the highest level of safety for EU citizens actually has some weak points and even a few gaps. [...]

An overview of the last ten years of notifications related to food contaminated with mycotoxins.In order to protect food consumers and livestock, mycotoxin levels in food and feed need to be controlled because they have toxic properties that can sometimes cause chronic negative health effects (Bhat et al. 2010; Wild and Gong 2010). While the Europe [...]

Whether it is an administrative case or a criminal case, the consequences for noncompliance in the preparation and handling of foodstuffs and feedstuffs appear to vary widely. We interviewed four legal experts in the field.The problem of safety of use in the cereal chain is primarily linked to mycotoxin contamination. ochratoxin A (OTA), zearalenon [...]

Affidia interviewed two of the principle players in testing inspection and certification of grain shipments to learn how real investigations are conducted and to understand the unmet challenges in this field.Globalization has increased the international circulation of commodities. For some of these commodities, globalization has meant the establish [...]

Unsafe foods incidents occur for many reasons and can lead to public health issues, sales losses, and harm to a company’s reputation. The response to unsafe food crises requires careful methods and precise procedures.Food businesses are placing more and more emphasis on quality and safety control and on the traceability of products. At the same t [...]

One of the most expensive nuts is sometimes contaminated by aflatoxin at levels above EU regulatory limits. Here we try to understand to what extent the dramatic decrease in Iranian pistachio border rejections has been due to the change in regulatory limits.The origin of the word pistachio comes from the Persian word pesteh. Iran has the largest nu [...]

Ukraine, one of the world’s largest grain exporters, faces mycotoxin-related challenges in an expanding export market. This article explains how grain stakeholders in Ukraine conduct mycotoxin risk management, which analysis methods they use, and why they choose them.The impact of mycotoxins on human health and on the economyMycotoxins are toxic [...]

A changing environment and ambitious plans to ramp up wheat exports pushes Russian veterinary watchdog Rosselhoznadzor to enhance control over the presence of mycotoxins in grain.Rosselkhoznadzor is currently designing a new traceability system to ensure exported grain is free of mycotoxins. Russia needs to tighten control over the quality of expor [...]

A survey to investigate topics including the technologies used, the number of analyses conducted, and the test kits’ certifications.Rapid testing for grainAflatoxin and deoxynivalenol (DON) contamination of grain depends on several factors, primary among them weather conditions in the pre-harvest period. In Europe, aflatoxin in corn is mostly a p [...]

Abstract – Ochratoxin A has been regulated in Europe since 2006, with the first official risk assessment dating back to 1994. There have been many efforts over the years in the agro-food system to control, monitor, and mitigate its occurrence in food commodities. However, the recent scientific evaluation of EFSA shed light on several still-open i [...]

I will never forget the face of a lab manager in a tech meeting who reported the very high CV she measured after using a certified ELISA kit. The kit was not certified for the material she had tested. Nor will I ever forget that several feed industries have a museum of LFD readers (each brand requiring its own reader, of course) because they couldn [...]

A never-ending story and lessons learned.At the beginning of the first dioxin crises at the end of the last century, we did not anticipate that they would continue to pop up as a problem in the world for so long and that so many unexpected dioxin sources existed in the feed and food sector (see the figure on page 46). Over time, we have learned man [...]

A lot of words, reports, and good will but where is the reduction in agricultural antibiotic use? “Antimicrobial resistance is the ability of microorganisms, such as bacteria, to become increasingly resistant to an antimicrobial to which they were previously susceptible. AMR is a consequence of natural selection and genetic mutation. Such mu [...]

The presence of antibiotics in fresh water: the global antimicrobial resistance threat, inadequate legislation, and technical gaps in water treatment systems.The worldwide use and abuse of antimicrobials in the past 50 years has had a heavy impact on the planet’s ecosystems. Antimicrobial-resistant genes, already present in bacteria, are now more [...]

Antimicrobial resistance is selected for in human and veterinary medicine alike, and resistance may be transferred from animals to humans and vice versa.IntroductionAntimicrobial (antibiotic, antifungal, antiviral, and antiparasitic) resistance (AMR) is defined as the development in microorganisms such as bacteria, fungi, viruses, and some parasite [...]

Antibiotic use and antimicrobial resistance; personal experience, policies and regulatory response.BackgroundAntimicrobial compounds are a natural phenomenon in any microbiome. As an example, in the human microbiome it is estimated as many as 1011 organisms per milliliter are found in the large intestine. A healthy human microbiome, immune system a [...]

Russian authorities claim they want to decrease antibiotic use both in veterinary and healthcare systems but any changes have been delayed either because of the cost to the federal treasury, potentially amounting to billions of rubles, or because local businesses do not welcome these changes.Anti-antibiotics campaign is needed in RussiaOn 3 Decembe [...]

Insight to the point of view of animal health authorities, food producers and retailers.The point of view of animal health authorities in one EU country: education and training are very important, aside the regulations, in order to reduce antibiotic use.In the EU, total antibiotic use on average has decreased significantly over the past 5 years. No [...]

The European food production industry has been shaken over the past two years by multiple reports of foodborne outbreaks. Food safety authorities also report a trend in the growing number of outbreak-related recalls. Is something going wrong?IntroductionThe summer of 2019 saw numerous foodborne outbreaks linked to Listeria and Salmonella in Europe, [...]

Because of its relatively high price and its liquid form, honey has been a target for food fraud perpetrators from time immemorial.Honey. Naturally delicious, syrupy and sweet, with a delicate, unique flavour, honey has been prized as a special food since pre-history. Cave paintings in Europe that date back more than 8000 years depict humans foragi [...]

Although multiresidue detection seems like the ideal screening test for antibiotic residues, just a few platforms that accomplish this are actually available. Advantages and limitations of the commercially available systems are hereby presented.Although multiresidue detection in food and feed seems like the ideal screening test, and although a hund [...]

How new fraud definitions and production guidelines together with state-of-the-art analytical tools help to ensure that honey in the marketplace is authentic and truly labeled.Food authenticity and food fraud by economically motivated adulteration have been major issues in the food sector since the horse meat scandal in 2013. The EU Commission publ [...]

Traditional methods for honey authentication become obsolete or demand load of resources. New rapid methods are on the rise.Raw honey is considered to be a natural energy source with many positive effects on health: antioxidant, antibacterial, and antifungal properties; hay fever prevention; prebiotic; sore throat remedy; etc. On the other hand, if [...]

Do we know how many people suffer from food allergies?   The socio-economic impact of food allergies Allergy-related health loss is estimated to be of the same order of magnitude as prostate cancer or rheumatoid arthritis and it may be more severe than that of heart disease, skin cancer, or Parkinson’s disease (Houben 2019). Patien [...]

European Union, USA, Canada, Hong Kong, Australia, and New Zelando: an update Abstract As part of an EU-funded project (FP7) to develop “Integrated approaches to food allergen and allergy management”, a database was constructed from publicly available information on allergen recalls between 2011 and 2014 in Europe, North America, Hong [...]

How the VITAL scientific expert panel developed their reference doses; understanding and managing the reference doses and reference quantities. Introduction Food allergy is a major public health concern globally, which potentially affects up to 5% of adults and 8-10% of children (Gupta et al. 2011, Osborne et al. 2011, Nwaru 2014). In the [...]

Product labeling is uneven in different countries and, even at the European level, legislation has gaps both for food producers and for consumers. Some countries, such as the UK, are moving to implement new national legislation.Introduction According to the final RASFF (Rapid Alert System for Food and Feed) report for 2018 (European Commission 201 [...]

 Standardization of methods could soon be easier. Introduction Effective food allergen risk assessment and food allergen management are important to protect allergic consumers and to comply with allergen labeling regulations. Such approaches require reliable analytical tools for the detection of allergens in food. Due to the nature o [...]

ELISA kits can hardly be considered quantitative and LFDs play a key role in the food industry but performance is rarely documented.Regulatory environment EU Regulation No 1169/2011 specifies fourteen substances or products causing allergens or intolerances for which food labeling is mandatory when they are known ingredients. If there is a ris [...]

FDA is increasing its efforts to enforce FSMA. “Cross-contact” must be controlled in items exported to the US. Rapid methods play a key role in the Allergen Control Plans of manufacturers. New regulations for private third-party food laboratory accreditation are expected soon.The authors of the recently published “Prevalence and Severity of F [...]

Comparing food producers and caterers: what differences exist for managing allergens?  The majority of food allergens so far studied show common features: they are low molecular weight proteins (10-70 kd) and they are stable in the presence of heat, proteases, and acid. Allergic reactions are relatively dose-independent and there is great [...]

The point of view of the test kit manufacturers. Service laboratories and industries, as well as governmental bodies, rely on ELISA kits for the detection of food allergens. Recently, a number of guidelines for the validation of ELISA methods for detecting allergens have been issued by the analytical chemistry community (AOAC) and by technical [...]

Laboratories primarily use ELISA kits and while sensitivity is considered satisfactory, recoveries in some matrices are not – opinions diverge about thresholds and the need for multiplex methods.The allergen testing laboratory point of view is interesting because laboratories operate between test kit manufacturers and food businesses. Allergen te [...]

At the beginning of my career in the in-vitro diagnostic industry, I was attending a seminar in Milan on biosensors for the agri-food industry. It was 1988 or so. Many speakers told us that biosensor technology was going to allow the food industry to rapidly detect any kind of contaminant. I was impressed. As a young biotechnologist busy with ELISA [...]