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Food safety and quality concern increasingly both consumers and the entire food sector involved. The European Union has implemented specific legislation for food products in order to monitor food safety and quality, protecting each country's culture, history and local economy at the same time. Moreover, Europe's heritage is being enriched, by establishing quality schemes such as Protected Designation of Origin (PDO) and Protected Geographical Indication (PGI). Europe's interest and concern regarding food safety proved also by Framework Program 5 Horizon 2020 continuous funding.Food traceability as well as food authentication constitute inseparable parts of food safety and quality. This systematic review presents innovative research technologies which are used in Europe for food traceability and authentication and published within the period 2010–2018. Moreover, information about the method used, the country of origin, the food type and the level of food process, are provided.This paper offers a new possible approach regarding the combination of the existing definitions of food traceability and authentication, as far as food provenance is concerned. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Food safety has been a growing concern among European Union ( EU) citizens over the last decades. Despite the fact that food has never been safer, consumers are considerably uncertain and increasingly critical about the safety of their food. The introduction of new principles, such as the primary responsibility of producers, traceability, risk analysis, the separation of risk assessment and risk management provided a more transparent, science-based system in Europe, which can help to restore consumers' lost confidence. The present EU integrated approach to food safety 'from farm to fork' aims to assure a high level of food safety within the EU. © 2014 Society of Chemical Industry [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In a regime of harmonized permitted health claims under Regulation 1924/20061 (the Claims Regulation), differentiating commercial communications from others has become a challenge in the food industry. The Flexibility Principle, laid down in Recital (9) of Regulation 432/2012,2,3 plays a key role here, allowing for the use of a wording different from that expressly authorized. The use of health claims referring directly to the brand name of a product (Brand-specific Claims), instead of the specific nutrient or other substance subject of the authorized claim, is expressly prohibited in the recommendations on general principles on flexibility of wording for health claims4 (Flexibility Guidance). This article examines the legality of such outright prohibition in the light of EU law. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The European Parliament and the Council Regulation (EU) No 1169/2011 modifies existing food labelling provisions in the European Union to allow consumers to make informed choices and to make safe use of food, while at the same time ensure the free movement of legally produced and marketed food. It entered into force on 12 December 2011. It shall apply starting from 13 December 2014. Following an informal working practice, the Commission's Health and Consumer Directorate General has published a document ["Questions and Answers on the application of Regulation (EU) No 1169/2011 on the provision of food information to consumers"] in order to provide answers to a series of questions concerning the application of the Regulation. This document aims at assisting all players in the food chain as well as the competent national authorities to better understand and correctly apply the above-mentioned Regulation. However, it has no formal legal status and in the event of a dispute, ultimate responsibility for the interpretation of the law lies with the Court of Justice of the European Union. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article offers an overview of the competitive impact of the joint purchasing agreements (JPAs) or buying alliances in Europe's food chain. It explores the role of JPAs in the European Union (EU) competition law, case law, and the decisions taken by the European Commission, analyzing whether this offers a ground to pay closer attention to the formation and operation of the large buyer alliances in the grocery retail industry. It also explores how case law and decisions are distributed in the dimensions of buyer power as well as downstream market power.

The so-called Hygiene Package is the EU's legal linchpin for ensuring the production of safe food within and outside the Union. This legislation aims to cover a vast array of food products and processes; from basic, commonsensical rules on the storage of fresh fruit and vegetables to the complex standards for animal slaughter and hygienic carcass handling. In addition, the Hygiene Package applies to a broad variety of different food business operators - from major international companies with huge production output and regulatory resources to farming families producing solely for local markets. Of course, all food, irrespective of the commodity concerned or the nature of its production, must achieve the same level of safety. However, a concern over the threat of excessive and disproportionate hygiene standards for small businesses, including, but not limited to, those in the artisanal and traditional food sectors, is also to be found in the Hygiene Package's provisions. So-called 'flexibilities' exist throughout the Hygiene Package to guard against this risk of over-regulation. These flexibilities cannot and do not represent carte blanche exemptions from the Hygiene Package and must continue to satisfy the overall principles of food risk regulation as set down in the EU's General Food Law. This article examines the extent to which the flexibilities foreseen by the Hygiene Package really enable a proportionately tailored regulatory regime for small-scale food business operators. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Switzerland is not a Member State of the European Union and European Law is not applicable in Switzerland. However, several legal provisions in Swiss law contain references to European Regulations and Directives. Other Swiss provisions are transcripts of European regulations, the so called "autonomous adaptation" of European Law into Swiss Law. In this way Switzerland has been able to adopt most of the content of European Food Law, but it was also able to choose from the European provisions or to interpret and correct them. In 2010 Switzerland started to revise completely its Federal Act of 9 October 1992 on Foodstuffs and Utility Articles (Foodstuffs Act, FSA). One aim of this revision is the adoption of the principles of Regulation (EC) No 178/2002 which have not been implemented in Swiss Food Law yet. The message and the draft of the revised act were published in May 2011. This revision can be seen as an acknowledgment of the achievements of the European General Food Law. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The most fundamental notion underlying ten years of reform of EU food safety law has been codified in Article 14(1) of Regulation (EC) 178/2002: food shall not be placed on the market if it is unsafe. This notion has been elaborated in most of the rest of EU food law, first and foremost in the other paragraphs of Article 14. This contribution analyses Article 14 and argues in favour of a text-conform interpretation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article offers news briefs related to the European Union (EU) food policy in Europe. Health claims that have been officially banned in the EU are being advertised due to its submission to the Article 13 generic list. The European Commission will possibly include some elements on food from cloned animals in the second Novel Foods proposal. Despina Spanou, chairman of Platform for Action on Diet, Physical Activity and Health, recommends the food industry to use the media in handling obesity.

This article is an overview of the recent EU law regulating fortification. The addition of nutrients into commonly eaten foods has been a common practice for many centuries. The practice is now known as "fortification" and is regularly used by European food manufactures, as well as worldwide. Prior to the new EU regulation Member State rules on the voluntary addition of vitamins and minerals to foods varied widely. In some States it was allowed, without restriction, to add vitamins and mineral to the food, if the addition did not pose any risk to health. In others, the addition or the enrichment was only allowed if it could be demonstrated that there was a nutritional need. These differences posed problems for free movement of goods in the EU. Foods produced in one Member State did not meet the standards applicable in other Member States. The purpose of EC Regulation 1925/2006 is to harmonise this area of the law so as to remove technical barriers to the free movement of goods but at the same time to set a high level of consumer protection across the Union. The Regulation covers the addition of vitamins and minerals and of certain other substances to foods. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The production of fermented foods is one of the oldest food processing technologies known to man. Since the dawn of civilisation, methods for the fermentation of milks, meats, fish and vegetables have been used to produce safe foods with distinctive organoleptic properties. Microbial food cultures (MFC) with a technological impact on food are called "starter cultures". They may be present as natural microflora in the food, or as a result of the intentional addition of the microorganisms in an industrial food fermentation process. MFC that are used for their beneficial effect on consumers' health are called probiotics. Probiotics are always intentionally added to the food as they have been carefully selected and studied to guarantee that they provide a proven beneficial effect to consumers. They may be used in both fermented and non-fermented foods such as food supplements. This paper aims to provide an overview of the European regulatory framework which governs the use and labelling of commercial microbial food cultures intentionally added in a food manufacturing process. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: The EU is currently struggling to implement coherent coexistence regulations on genetically modified (GM) and non-GM crops in all member states. While it stresses that any approach needs to be “proportionate to the aim of achieving coexistence”, very few studies have actually attempted to assess whether the proposed spatial ex ante coexistence regulations (SEACERs) satisfy this proportionality condition. In this article, we propose a spatial framework based on an existing landscape and introduce the concept of shadow factor as a measure for the opportunity costs induced by SEACERs. Our empirical findings led us to advance the proposition that flexible SEACERs based on pollen barriers are more likely to respect the proportionality condition than rigid SEACERs based on isolation distances. Particularly in early adoption stages, imposing rigid SEACERs may substantially slow down GM crop adoption. Our findings argue for incorporating a certain degree of flexibility into SEACERs by advising pollen barrier agreements between farmers rather than imposing rigid isolation distances on GM farmers. The empirical questions of proportionality and flexibility have been largely ignored in the literature on coexistence and provide timely information for EU policy makers. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

The Proposal for the Provision of Information to Consumers is best known for its aim to tackle obesity by providing clear information to consumers. However it is also being used as a way in which to address what has been described as "an missed opportunity" by the European Court of Justice in the Lidl, Italia case to set out the different responsibilities of food business operators through out the food chain. This article analysis these new proposed provisions and its potential impact on the laws of the UK. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article examines the European food industry's cross-border expansion and how that trend is affecting food tastes and consumption habits across the European Union. Through the examination of market dynamics, current food trends, consumer behavior, and the growth in private label products, the article attempts to explain the changing dynamics of the market. By highlighting these changing dynamics a potential clash between commerce and culture is identified and explained. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Point (HACCP) Program was introduced as a mandatory measure in the EU in the 1990s. Despite its impact on the food industry, only limited literature addresses the issue of cost and benefits of HACCP at the firm level in Europe. This paper illustrates the results of a pilot study on case studies in Italy, UK and The Netherlands, providing a first assessment of the order of magnitude of costs of compliance and a qualitative illustration of the main benefits perceived by producers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Cites a study which aims to give an overview of the research activities planned for acrylamide in the Heat-Generated Food Toxicants (HEATOX) project, a project funded by the European Union. Aim of the project to identify, characterize, and minimize the possible health risks from heat-generated food toxicants; Effort to give recommendations on how to minimize the formation of heat-induced hazardous compound in food products; Development and validation of new or optimized analytical methods both for analysis of toxicants in foods and for analysis of biomarkers in tissues.