Issue #18 2021-12-13
Food prices, tanker fraud and the best name for cultured seafood
The impacts of rising food prices
Affordability (a silver lining for US consumers?)
Food fraud in food tanker vehicles
Seafood that isn’t from the sea
Food fraud incidents and horizon scanning updates from the past week
Hi,
Welcome to another issue of The Rotten Apple. It’s great to see so many old - and new - colleagues and customers signing up.
The biggest news in food this week is the rising cost of it (food). Why do we care? Because fluctuating prices impact food fraud vulnerabilities. And because we all eat.
Also this week, what should we call seafood that isn’t from the sea? I have the answer. Plus, multiple instances of fraud in the food transport sector as supply chain pressures bite.
As always, this issue ends with a list of food fraud incidents from the past week.
Announcement: Starting next year, I’ll be adding audio to this newsletter so you can catch up on your food integrity news by listening. Your job probably involves too much reading already, so I’m gonna give your eyeballs a break! If you’re a text lover - or compulsive skimmer - don’t despair, a full text format will always be part of The Rotten Apple.
Karen
P.S. Please hit the heart button if you like today’s newsletter. Got feedback? Just reply to this email; I read every response. And do please share this post with your colleagues and friends if you think they’ll find it interesting.
Food Prices
…. and their impact on food integrity issues
Right now, food is expensive. The Food and Agriculture Organisation’s Food Price Index is at its highest in 10 years. The main drivers are the high prices of all major cereals, particularly wheat, and the vegetable oil index hitting an all-time.
In America, meat prices are the big news. They heavily influence overall food prices, because Americans spend a significant portion of their food budget on meat. USA food prices have been increasing 3.6% per month for food at home and 3.9% per month for food away from home since April 2020. These are the largest price increases in grocery foods for a decade. For restaurant foods, they are the biggest increases in forty years.
Beef, pork and chicken are now 26, 19 and 15 percent more expensive than they were before the COVID-19 pandemic began.
The causes? Labour supply shortages and increasing labour costs. Wages for food manufacturing workers are up 11 percent compared to pre-pandemic times, while wages for workers in animal slaughtering plants are up even more, by 19 percent.
In retail and food service, wages have risen by 9 percent and 16 percent respectively over the same period.
Other causes for the rising prices of meat in America include the rising demand for US meat, both locally and in export markets; extreme weather events including major droughts; and the rising cost of herbicides and fertilisers.
Globally, the price of crude oil, which started to rise in April 2020 has a strong influence on the costs of producing and transporting food.
Weather-related crop failures and the growing demand for biodiesel have been blamed for the massive increase in edible oil crop prices (globally) in the past two years. Prices increased by 17 percent between 2019 and 2020.
Extreme weather events and unforeseen weather events are predicted to get worse over the medium to long term, which will continue to impact price volatility well into the future.
From a food integrity perspective, the uncertainty in supply chains and unpredictable price movements increase risk. In 2021, agri-food businesses are grappling with logistics/shipping challenges, climate-event-related crop failures and labour shortages. (There’s even a cream cheese crisis in New York!).
These challenges can tempt legitimate food business operators to perpetrate food crimes. They also open up opportunities for ‘bad actors’ to enter the food supply chain to exploit vulnerabilities. Both food fraud and exploitative labour practices can be expected to increase.
In short: 🍏 Higher prices and increased volatility increases food fraud vulnerabilities 🍏 Prices are likely to be increasingly impacted by climate change 🍏 Exploitative labour practices are also likely to increase with price pressures 🍏 Globally edible oil crop prices have risen since 2019 🍏 In the USA meat prices have increased significantly 🍏
Sources:
https://news.un.org/en/story/2021/11/1104962
https://econofact.org/what-is-driving-the-increase-in-food-prices
The cream cheese crisis: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/12/04/nyregion/cream-cheese-shortage-nyc-bagels.html
Food prices
… but it’s not all bad for USA consumers?
While international food businesses struggle with prices and supply issues, things might not be quite so bad for consumers, at least in the USA. With rising wages in that country, the affordability of food has not been as badly impacted as you might imagine, at least according to one agri-economist.
He compared average wages to food prices between 1980 and today. In 1980, a worker on a median salary would have had to work almost 3 hours to earn enough money to buy at 20 pound turkey. In 2019, the worker would have had to work less than half that time to buy a turkey. So turkey has become more affordable.
Hams have also become more affordable by the same measure. Beef steak, on the other hand, is more expensive today compared to the past. Bread and potatoes were more expensive between 2008 and 2012 than they are today.
The takeaway? Food economics are complicated. But you already knew that, right?!
In short: 🍏 When wages go up, food prices go up, but food doesn’t necessarily get less affordable 🍏 It’s complicated 🍏
Source: https://econofact.org/what-is-driving-the-increase-in-food-prices
Food Fraud
Supply chain pressures tempt transport companies to commit fraud?
Unless you’ve been living under a rock these past months you will know that international transport operations are under severe pressure. This is partly due to a shortage of truck (lorry) drivers in some parts of Europe, UK and North America.
It’s getting hard to move goods around. Hard and expensive. So you can (sort of) see why some Spanish trucking companies might have been tempted to do the wrong thing with their food transport vehicles.
The vehicles in question are food grade tankers. They are supposed to be used exclusively for transporting food. Unfortunately, it seems that some Spanish trucking companies were filling them with other goods for their return journeys.
Other things? Animal feed, animal processing by-products and fuels were found in ‘food-grade’ tankers. Authorities allege the tankers were not properly washed between loads.
At least one person has been accused of falsifying truck washing records, while others are said to have removed food-grade labelling or stickers from the tankers so as to avoid inspections.
Why Spain? The Spanish Agency for Food Safety and Nutrition and the Guardia Civil initiated the operation in early 2021. They inspected almost 400 companies associated with food tank transport operations and performed more than 700 checks at vehicle washing centres and roads-sides.
Is this happening in other countries and regions? Almost certainly.
If your food company receives or delivers food materials in tankers, this type of fraud is something to watch out for.
In short: 🍏 Food tankers have been used for non-food materials in Spain and probably elsewhere 🍏 Fraudulent washing records have been alleged 🍏 This is a food fraud to watch out for if your company uses tanker transport for ingredients or finished goods 🍏
Source:
https://www.foodsafetynews.com/2021/12/operation-finds-violations-in-spanish-food-transport-sector/
Food Authenticity
What to call seafood that isn’t from the sea (and why names matter)
We’ve got plant-based ‘meat’, plant-based ‘dairy’, lab-grown meat, 3D-printed meat and lab-grown seafood. We use words like meat, milk and cheese to describe these foods, but can we come up with better names?
‘Plant-based milk’ is a pretty unsexy name for a product category that is growing rapidly in popularity and importance. Plus, it’s not even legal in some parts of the world! Likewise, the use of the word ‘meat’ has been a problem in some places too.
While naming conventions might not seem like a big deal, the regulatory status of non-traditional foods does depend somewhat on how we choose to name them. Many countries require food products to be labelled with a “common or usual” name so that consumers can make informed choices. If an industry doesn’t have a widely accepted “common name” to work with, approvals can be more difficult.
The cell-cultured seafood segment is one category that is working to prevent future problems with naming conventions. Cell-cultured seafood needs to be differentiated from traditionally grown/harvested seafood for consumers, but any name needs to clearly signal the presence of seafood allergens. You wouldn’t want an allergic consumer to wrongly assume a fish-alternative product was made from plant proteins.
Researchers set out to find a consumer-friendly name for lab-grown seafood that that could be adopted by the industry from its earliest days.
They wanted a name that would make it clear to consumers that a cell-cultured seafood product was not from wild or farmed fish, but that it was still ‘fish’ from an allergen perspective. They also wanted a name that didn’t convey negative connotations about the cell-growing-technology or about the conventional seafood industry. The name also had to be suitable for conveying ideas around the safety and nutrition status of the products.
The researchers used packages that would mimic store-bought cell-cultured Atlantic salmon and tested 1200 American consumers for their attitudes and understanding of the terms “Cell-Cultured Seafood” and “Cell-Based Seafood”.
The winner? Both names are suitable for allowing consumers to make an informed decision, but “Cell-Based Seafood” performed better in willingness to taste and willingness to purchase. The researchers are calling on industry to adopt “Cell-Based Seafood” as the common name for this product type while the segment is in its infancy.
Side note: The US Food Safety Inspection Service called for comments on the naming of cultured meats earlier this year. Outcomes have not yet been shared. https://www.fsis.usda.gov/policy/federal-register-rulemaking/federal-register-rules/labeling-meat-or-poultry-products
In short: 🍏 Having a common name for a novel food assists consumers and makes labelling regulations easier for producers 🍏 Researchers found the ‘best’ common name for lab-made seafood 🍏 The researchers suggest that industry adopt the common name now 🍏
Source: https://ift.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/1750-3841.15860
Food Fraud Incidents and Horizon Scanning
Food fraud incidents added to Food Fraud Risk Information Database in the past week
· Authorities have alleged fraud in the use of 'food-grade' tankers for moving food. It's said that non-food materials are being transported on return journeys and that washing records might have been faked - Spain https://www.foodsafetynews.com/2021/12/operation-finds-violations-in-spanish-food-transport-sector/
· Palm oil from Ghana has been found with unauthorised colours Sudan III and Sudan IV - The Netherlands https://webgate.ec.europa.eu/rasff-window/screen/notification/518289
· Authorities shut an icecream factory that was using industrial (unauthorised) colours and food service outlets that were selling expired food - Pakistan https://www.urdupoint.com/en/pakistan/pfa-shut-down-ice-cream-production-unit-after-1421505.html
· Officials have reported widespread food fraud in unpackaged edible oils in Bangladesh. Problems include dilution/substitution with other oils that are not on the label, non-food-grade drums, quality and safety issues - Bangladesh https://www.tbsnews.net/economy/industry/food-authorities-find-adulteration-all-unpackaged-edible-oil-340201
Here’s what you missed last month
The new GFSI benchmarking scheme for food safety auditors is supposed to encourage more people to take up the profession. But it has some people worried. I unpacked the benchmarking rules in Issue #15.
Also in Issue #15, Prof Chris Elliott is warning of melamine-like fraud adulterants in plant protein powders.