The European Commission's Joint Research Centre (JRC) has published its January 2021 Food Fraud Monthly Summary reporting food fraud incidents and investigations from around the world. Thanks again to our Member Bruno Séchet for creating this infographic and allowing us to share it with the rest of the Network
Read the January 2021 Summary here
China's State Administration for Market Regulation (SAMR) has issued warnings to consumers about the safety of certain fermented foods following a severe food poisoning incident in Heilongjiang province last year when nine members of a family died after consuming home made fermented maize noodles. The cause of the fatalities was a respiratory toxin produced by Pseudomonas cocovenans. There were other severe local food poisoning outbreaks from other home made fermented corn noodles, fermented rice noodles and an edible fungus. Hence, SAMR have warned against consumption or sales of home made fermented products.
The Chinese Ministry of Public Security issued data on 1,400 cases of counterfeit food investigated from May to November 2020, and thought that the move to online shopping made fraud easier. There are two types of fraud. One type is registering a trade mark very similar in name of a branded product to cause some confusion when purchased by the consumer. The other is the direct counterfeiting of a label of a branded product. As an example of the latter, Penfolds wines have been the victim of counterfeiting in China for some years and which is thought to have been worth almost US$ 20million.
Read the article here
This article summarises the authenticity analytical approaches (based on building blocks of food) to identify the most suitable procedures to prevent food fraud. The methods described are not exhaustive, but cover the majority of approaches that are currently
undertaken. In particular, DNA methodology, proteomics, chromatographic methods and stable isotope ratio analysis are discussed.
Read the full article here
This study used DNA barcoding to identify fish species and microbiome profiling to study the presence of pathogens. Between February 2018 and October 2020, 127 fish samples were collected from restaurants (83 samples), and the remainder (44 samples) from hypermarkets, supermarkets, markets, seafood wholesalers/retailers, and fishing harbours. The microbiological analysis was undertaken because most of the restaurant samples were raw fish sashimi/sushi. The study found that 24 of the samples were mislabelled as regards the fish species, and snapper had the largest number of mislabelled samples (11), which had been substituted by tilapia. This may be due to the labelling of tilapia as Taiwan-Snapper.
Read the article here
The quality and price of tea produced in different regions varies greatly, and this research investigated whether elemental content determined by X-ray fluorescence (XRF) spectroscopy can indicate origin of commercial teas. A total of 75 tea samples from tea producing countries throughout the world were analysed for their elemental content, and 18 elements were selected for analysis based on their repeatability performance. Tea origin was determined by multivariate classification of the tea into 5 major geographical regions then two regions, Asian and non-Asian. The Asian vs non-Asian classification of the teas reached an 85% correct prediction rate.
Read the abstract here
The volume of trade of food sold over the internet is both growing and changing at a rapid rate, and there is increasing concern about the potential safety and the possibility of food fraud of this trade. In this article, the FSA (Food Standards Agency) explains what action it is taking to regulate the online trade in food, especially dealing with the proliferation of unregistered businesses on online platforms. In particular, FSA has been rolling out a digital Register a Food Business tool, which allows businesses to register digitally with their local authority using a smart phone, tablet or PC.
Read the article here
There have been an increasing number of cases of substitution of organic produce by conventially grown produce driving the need for robust methods to authenticate organically grown produce. Metabolomics to distinguish organic produce from conventially grown produce has been used for some time. This review examines the latest applications, advantages, challenges and future perspectives of HRMS based targeted and untargeted metabolomics for discrimination between organic and conventional crops. It concludes that data from combined techniques, such as untargeted and targeted metabolomics or metabolomics and stable isotope analysis, can improve the robustness of discriminative models, but they require further validation.
Read the abstract here
Plaintiffs of the lawsuit. who collected tuna sandwiches at multiple Subway outlets in California and had them analysed, claim that the sandwiches contain neither tuna nor fish. Subway denies the plaintiffs' claim.
Read the article
There is increasing demand for buffalo milk products. Italian researchers investigated the presence of undeclared cow's milk in buffalo yoghurt using a real-time PCR assay. They analysed 72 buffalo yoghurt samples and found that 18 of them contained bovine DNA. They recommend that this is a high priority area for investigation.
Read the abstract here
This book serves as a practical resource on the topic of food fraud prevention and compliance with regulatory and industry standards. It includes a brief overview of the history of food fraud, current challenges, and vulnerabilities faced by the food industry, and requirements for compliance with regulatory and industry standards on mitigating vulnerability to food fraud, with a focus on the Global Food Safety Initiative (GFSI) Benchmarking Requirements.
More information on the contents here
2H NMR spectroscopy has been the official method to detect sugar addition and water to wine for many decades. Recently, 1H NMR spectroscopy, a simpler and faster method (in terms of sample preparation), has gathered more and more attention in wine analysis, even though it lacks official recognition. This technique makes targeted quantitative determination of wine ingredients and non-targeted detection of the metabolomic fingerprint of a wine sample possible. This review summarises the possibilities and limitations of 1H NMR spectroscopy in analytical wine authentication.
Read the full open access paper here
CAMS (Community for Analytical Measurement Science) is an industry-led initiative aimed at promoting world-class analytical measurement science training, research and innovation by bringing together a network of industrial and academic partners with interests in these fields.
The purpose of this CAMS Call is to encourage research and innovation within the field of analytical measurement science. Funding is available to co-fund a number of Lectureships, PostDocs and PhDs awards.
As CAMS is an industry-led network, applicants and their academic institutions are expected to work closely with CAMS Industry Members throughout the duration of the award. Applications should align with at least one of CAMS’s priority areas (listed below) and wherever possible address a specific industry challenge:
● Point of use sensors and photonics
● Complex mixtures, separations and detection
● Data analytics
● Novel instrumentation or technique
There are no restrictions on age or nationality, but applicants should be eligible to undertake an academic appointment within the British Isles - England, Scotland, Wales or the Island of Ireland (both Northern Ireland and Republic of Ireland). It is anticipated that recipients of a CAMS award would reside and conduct their programme of work within the British Isles for the duration of the award.
More application details here
Deadline for applications is 17:00 GMT 19 February 2021
NMR has been used for the authenticity of wines for over 30 years, but has evolved significantly in the last two decades. It was developed as the official method for added water and sugar to wine, but its use in metabolomics gives a lot of information on grape varieties, cultivation techniques and vintage. NMR can also yield information on geographic origin.
Read the full open access paper.
Natural vanilla flavour from the vanilla pod is an expensive product, and many manufacturers use synthetic vanillin to flavour their products. In the US, there has been a proliferation of class action lawsuits against manufacturers using "vanilla" in the name of the food e.g. vanilla ice-cream. This has been on the basis that most manufacturers using vanilla in the name of the food are not disclosing the true source of the vanilla flavour to consumers. A third of the cases were dismissed, and many more are pending dismissal, but one case was settled for $3 million.
Read the article for the full story
The Food Authenticity Network Newsletter January 2021 is now available (in the documents section). There is lots of information about the progress of our global Network and upcoming activities, as well as articles on blockchain and an inter-laboratory trial on handheld infrared instruments. Our Centre of Expertise profile is the Asset Centre at Queens University Belfast.
The Food Standards Agency (FSA) issued an alert on 18 January warning consumers, who had purchased meat products supplied by a Wiltshire fresh meat vendor via Facebook sites, not to consume them. The meat products (predominantly lamb, goat, veal, beef), of all meat species, were supplied by an unregistered and unapproved Wiltshire based vendor, and had not been produced in accordance with food safety and hygiene legislative requirements.
Read the FSA alert and the news article.
Herbs and spices have been shown to be the group of foods most susceptible to adulteration. This extensive review by Polish researchers examines the application of different types of NMR (nuclear magnetic resonance) combined with chemometrics to characterise and distinguish authentic and adulterated spice samples.
Read the full open access paper
Maple syrup, the concentrated sap of Acer saccharum March, is sought after for its unique flavour and taste. As a popular and high value product, it is increasingly susceptible to adulteration by other sugar syrups. This review looks at most recent advances in the analytical methods used for detecting the different types of maple syrup adulteration.It concludes that SpectrAcer and nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) are the most efficient methods for detection of maple syrup adulteration. SpectrAcer, an automated spectroscopy sytem developed by the Canadian company Acer, based reflected light at different wavelengths using the syrup's fluorescence properties with UV, and sugar composition at other wavelengths.
Read the abstract here
Prawns and shrimps are high value seafood vulnerable to species substitution. Indian reseachers have developed uniplex PCR assays using species specific primers based on the mitochondrial 16S RNA and Internal Transcriber Spacer (ITS1) genes for 7 commercially important prawns and shrimps (Penaeus vannamei, Fenneopenaeus indicus, Penaeus monodon, Macrobrachium rosenbergii, Metapenaeus affinis, Heterocarpus gibbosus,and Penaeus semisulcatus). The specificity of the primers was confirmed using targeted prawn and shrimp species and untargeted fish species. The developed assays were tested using 68 purchased prawn and shrimp products, and found that 16% of the samples were mislabelled.
Read the abstract here
In June 2020, there was an outbreak of SARS-CoV-2 at a Beijing market. The virus was found on the chopping bords of imported frozen Norwegian salmon, which caused a hasty removal of imported salmon from supermarket shelves. Also, earlier in January, the Chinese authorities reported that coronovirus was found in ice cream made with ingredients from New Zealand (milk powder) and Ukraine (whey powder).
This article discusses whether it is likely or not that the virus can be transmitted along the food chain, especially the cold chain, as now several peer reviewed articles by Chinese researchers claim.
Read the article here
