The European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) Panel on Food Contact materials, Enzymes and Processing Aids (CEP Panel) published the minutes of the 23rd through 29th meetings of its Working Group on bisphenol A (WG-BPA) re-evaluation as well as its subgroups held in February and March 2020. During the meetings, the experts:
- Re-discussed and proposed changes for the approach to weighting evidence from animal studies, as well the integration of evidence from animal and human studies;
- Removed some endpoints and adjusted the clustering of relevant endpoints;
- Resolved main issues related to the data extraction of the studies and specifically discussed extraction of data related to general toxicity and mammary gland proliferation;
- Discussed and introduced changes in the weight of evidence Excel file;
- Added new relevant endpoints.
The next meeting was scheduled to be held on March 31, 2020 by teleconference.
The EFSA CEP Panel also published the minutes of the 12th meeting of its Working Group on Food Contact Materials (WG-FCM), which was held on February 25-27, 2020. During the meeting, the group continued the safety evaluation of styrene for use in food contact materials (FCMs) following the mandate from EFSA (EFSA-Q-2019-00686). It also continued discussing the ongoing activities related to the prioritization of substances without a specific migration limit (SML) on the FCM Union List (EFSA-Q-2019-00150). The group discussed points raised by the most recent CEP Panel meeting in addition to the on-going collection of chemical and toxicological information, in-silico prediction results, and the current draft opinion. The group also heard feedback on the collaboration with other EU agencies regarding the revision of the Drinking Water Directive concerning materials in contact with drinking water (FPF reported).
The EFSA CEP Panel further published the minutes of the 12th meeting of its Working Group on Recycling Plastics (WG-RP), which was held on February 27-28, 2020. During the meeting, the group discussed the draft opinions of ten recycling processes. Of these, the following draft opinions were revised and scheduled for discussion and potential adoption at the next CEP Panel meeting on April 28, 2020: Viridor Waste Management (Starlinger iV+) (EFSA-Q-2019-00703), ESTERPET (Starlinger iV+) (EFSA-Q-2019-00749), and Veolia (URRC) (EFSA-Q-2018-00768). Changes to the draft opinions for two processes were noted and scheduled for further discussion at the next WG meeting: Plastrec recycling process (Polymetrix pellet) (EFSA-Q-2019-00294) and PET to PET Recycling Österreich (Starlinger HDPE) (EFSA-Q-2019-00296). For the ONDUPET (EREMA Basic) recycling process (EFSA-Q-2019-00379), more information has been requested from the applicant. Review of four other recycling processes was deferred to the next WG meeting: Severn Valley Polymers (Starlinger deCON) (EFSA-Q-2019-00698), Technoplastika Prima Perdana (Starlinger deCON) (EFSA-Q-2019-00737), WIP (Starlinger deCON) (EFSA-Q-2019-00758), and Carton Pack (Starlinger deCON) (EFSA-Q-2019-00787).
On April 28 to 30, 2020, the CEP Panel will hold its 13th plenary meeting, which will be open to observers. The agenda for the meeting is available, and registration to join is open until April 24, 2020.
Read more
EFSA CEP Panel (February and March 2020). “Minutes of the 23rd through 29th meetings of the working group on BPA re-evaluation.” (pdf)
EFSA CEP Panel (February 25-27, 2020). “Minutes of the 12th meeting of the working group on food contact materials 2018-2021.” (pdf)
EFSA CEP Panel (February 27-28, 2020). “Minutes of the 12th meeting of the working group on recycling plastics 2018-2021.” (pdf)
EFSA (March 2020). “13th plenary meeting of the CEP Panel – open for observers.”
