Food Expert Calls for Better Understanding of Food Fraud Issues

Release date: 11/18/2011

Stuart Shotton, a former Trading Standards Officer and expert in food legislation has claimed that the UK Enforcement Community may not be up to speed with the latest challenges facing the food industry with regard to food fraud.

Speaking after a recent conference on Food and Authenticity staged by Food Chain Europe and featuring several high profile speakers including the FSA, DEFRA Soil Association, Food Law experts and the Intellectual Property Office, Stuart Shotton said:

“What this conference emphasised was that central Government agencies are aware that food fraud and food authenticity issues are prevalent within the UK food sector; but that the actual scale of the issue is unknown.  This can pose a real challenge to everyone and I believe that is a potential knowledge gap on the issues in relation to food fraud among the UK Enforcement community.

“Authenticity isn’t just about passing off a piece of catfish as cod, it also covers condemned meat with fake health marks; the specific origin of products as well as the counterfeiting of recognised brands.

“The enforcement community continues to make great strides in tackling intellectual property crime for non-foods and the authenticity of alcohols; but presentations and discussions at our recent conference suggest that there may be a knowledge gap in relation to food.

“The FSA provides funding and the secondment of experts for food fraud and authenticity investigations to those Authorities that request assistance, but our experience suggests that knowledge of the methods available for the detection of food fraud are not as widely known. We would encourage Local Authorities to include authenticity verification as part of their annual sampling exercises with a potential focus on origin, using methods such as Polymerase Chain Reaction and Stable Isotope Testing providing the methodology; as well as encouraging the food industry to consider authenticity as part of their brand protection remit.”

ENDS

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