`Cooperation in Fight Against Food Fraud Grows Among EU Countries - Olive Oil Times

Cooperation in Fight Against Food Fraud Grows Among EU Countries

By Paolo DeAndreis
Jun. 5, 2020 08:44 UTC

The European Union noted in a new report that there has been greater coop­er­a­tion among mem­ber states when it comes to food fraud.

The fight against adul­ter­ation, mis­la­belling, forgery and coun­ter­feit has become a more coor­di­nated effort, and com­mon actions for the pro­tec­tion of the legal olive oil food chain are among the most vis­i­ble sign of such coop­er­a­tion.

In the lat­est annual report of the Administrative Assistance and Cooperation System (AAC-FF), the EU Directorate-gen­eral for Health and Food Safety con­firmed that the fats and oils sec­tor was one of the most active sec­tors of fraud-fight­ing among mem­bers states with 44 recorded instances of admin­is­tra­tive and inves­tiga­tive actions.

In the case of olive oil, the European Authority has recorded cases of olive oil mar­keted as extra vir­gin olive oil when they were in fact a blend of dif­fer­ent olive oil qual­i­ties. In other instances, the for­mal dec­la­ra­tion of organic olive oil did not match the con­tents of the pack­aged oil.

As an exam­ple,” the report noted, prod­ucts sold as Extra Virgin Olive Oil but which did not meet E.U. stan­dards and of infe­rior qual­ity were being dis­trib­uted to the restau­rants and retail trade in the United Kingdom. The prod­ucts were imported from Spain. Following a request from the United Kingdom addressed to Spain in the AAC-FF, actions were ini­ti­ated by the Spanish com­pe­tent author­i­ties against the food busi­ness oper­a­tor for a pos­si­ble fraud.”

In recent years, the food fraud ini­tia­tives of the AAC-FF have led to a series of new mar­ket reg­u­la­tions as well as tech­nol­ogy frame­works that make it eas­ier for the national author­i­ties to exchange rel­e­vant infor­ma­tion with part­ners and to take the appro­pri­ate mea­sures.



Advertisement
Advertisement

Related Articles