The European Commission has published its list of flavoring substances authorized for use in foods. Effective October 22, 2012, Regulation EU 872/2012 provides a roster of more than 2,500 substances evaluated by the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) and deemed safe for human food uses, while Regulation EU 873/2012 establishes transitional measures for other flavorings, such as those made from non-food sources, that are still under review. Flavoring substances not found on the list “will be banned after an 18-months phasing-out period.” To prepare the new regulations, EFSA’s Scientific Panel on Food Contact Materials, Enzymes, Flavorings and Processing Aids (the CEF Panel) initially considered approximately 2,800 substances already on the EU market as well as 197 additions. Although the majority of substances reportedly did not present safety concerns, the CEF Panel recommended removing seven substances from commerce and asked for further data on 400 others. Industry can submit data on…
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During a recent meeting of the European Union’s (EU’s) Standing Committee on the Food Chain and Animal Health, EU member states reportedly endorsed a European Commission proposal to establish a new list of permitted flavoring substances for food products. The committee also approved a transitional measure on other flavorings, including those made from non-food sources. Expected to be formally adopted unless opposed by the European Parliament, the two pieces of legislation aim to create clear rules for the use of flavoring substances within the European Union. The European Food Safety Authority and other scientific bodies assessed 2,800 flavorings to establish the list of allowable flavorings for use in food. Set for publication in an online database for consumers, industry and national food-control authorities, the list will be enforced six months after its adoption to provide sufficient time for the EU food industry to comply. See Europolitics, April 24, 2012.
California EPA’s Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment (OEHHA) has proposed adding two food and beverage flavorings, as well as a fungicide and an herbicide contaminant to the list of chemicals known to the state to cause cancer under the Safe Drinking Water and Toxic Enforcement Act of 1986 (Prop. 65).Comments are requested by April 10, 2012. The chemicals are beta-Myrcene and Pulegone, which are components of certain essential oils used to flavor foods and beverages and also used as a fragrance in cosmetics, soaps, detergents, and herbal medicines, and Isopyrazam, a fungicide used in Central and South America on bananas, and 3,3’,4,4’-Tetrachloroazo-benzene, a contaminant and degradation product of certain herbicides. OEHHA has proposed the action under the authoritative bodies listing mechanism, citing the National Toxicology Program and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency as institutions that have found the chemicals to be carcinogens or “likely to be carcinogenic.”
A federal court in California has reportedly dismissed without prejudice putative class claims filed against General Mills Inc. alleging that the company falsely conveyed to consumers that its Total Blueberry Pomegranate® cereal product contained real fruit. Dvora v. Gen. Mills Inc., No. 11-1074 (C.D. Cal., dismissed May 16, 2011). According to a news source, the court determined that the plaintiff’s state-law claims were preempted by federal product-labeling laws that allow a manufacturer to use a fruit’s name and image to describe a flavor even if the product contains no fruit. The claims were apparently based on allegations that the product was falsely labeled “naturally and artificially flavored” and the packaging was misleading. The court disagreed, saying, “If you look at the ingredients table, blueberry and pomegranate aren’t there. So I don’t understand how a reasonable consumer is somehow tricked into thinking it contains blueberry and pomegranate.” The court also said…
A Minnesota company that produces cheese has filed a complaint in federal court against an ingredients and flavorings company, alleging that it supplied a flavoring ingredient with phenolic compounds that “caused the cheese in which it was used to have a taste repugnant to certain of the customers who consumed the cheese.” Bongards’ Creameries v. Kerry Ingredients & Flavours, No. 10-2058 (D. Minn., filed May 14, 2010). According to the complaint, flavoring company representatives agreed that the cheese contained unacceptable levels of “off” flavors but refused to pay the cheese maker’s losses in excess of $1.3 million associated with the recall of 800,000 pounds of “contaminated cheese.” Alleging breach of implied warranties of merchantability and fitness for a particular purpose and breach of contract, the plaintiff seeks compensatory damages, attorney’s fees and costs.
“Flavor chemicals often make up less than one percent of the ingredients in processed foods, and many flavorists regard the terms ‘natural’ and ‘artificial’ as largely meaningless—an indulgence for consumers who happen to believe that one is more likely to be toxic than another, even if the perception is not necessarily true,” writes The New Yorker’s Raffi Khatchadourian in this article examining the history of the food flavoring industry. Shadowing a flavorist who works for the Swiss company Givaudan, Khatchadourian reports that this $20 billion per year sector has evolved from “simple and direct” applications of natural additives or essential oils to a precise molecular science. “Once you begin to consider the natural world at a molecular level, the boundaries that separate one fruit from another begin to seem like artifice,” he notes, adding that both the technology and the secretive business culture present unique regulatory challenges. “The flavor industry…
