South Korea updates Standards and Specifications for Utensils, Containers, and Packages; releases 2021 Food and Drug Safety White Paper; China updates precision level on food packaging migration requirements; Taiwan to monitor the use of nitrogen in food packaging; Hong Kong statutory authority encourages stricter standards for silicone food contact articles
Brominated flame retardants in European food contact materials
Black thermocups and kitchen utensils contaminated with brominated flame retardants from illicit recycling practices
Thailand proposes standards on plastic food contact articles
Thailand notifies the World Trade Organization of five draft regulations concerning plastic utensils as well as concerning microwaveable and non-microwavable plastic bags
Conference on chemical footprinting
BizNGO and Chemical Footprint Conference to take place on December 8-9, 2015 in Boston, MA, U.S.
Scientists review state of edible films and coatings
Two new reviews investigate types, properties, and application of edible films and coatings applied on food; reuse of food waste to protect fresh food; addition of nanomaterials identified to further increase mechanical and barrier properties of edible films
Beyond BPA – Many bisphenols migrate from food packaging
Four studies investigate bisphenol (BP) migration from food packaging and human health effects; demonstrate wide presence of 11 bisphenols in polystyrene take-out food containers from China, Canada, and Poland; report material quality influences BPA migration from polycarbonate cups; indicate higher BPA migration from lined cans than plastic packaging into meat based on probabilistic models; find bisphenols A, F, and S induce genotoxic effects and changes in human endogenous retroviruses (HERVs) expression using human blood cells
Studies investigate extractable and leachable FCCs, present collision cross section database
Scientists develop collisions cross section (CCS) database for leachable and extractable food contact chemicals (FCCs) to help in chemical identification during targeted and untargeted analysis; database covers 1038 CCS values; study tentatively identifies >100 migrants from 24 plastic food packaging articles including 11 that are of potential concern or are priority hazardous substances
Online retailers tackle dangerous products
Amazon, Alibaba, eBay, Rakuten France sign EU Commission’s ‘product safety pledge’ to remove dangerous products from sale more quickly; NGOs call for more specific action on hazardous chemicals
2023 FPF Workshop: Goals and policy processes for safe and sustainable FCMs
On the morning of the Food Packaging Forum’s 11th annual workshop, speakers share processes to measure sustainable food packaging while accounting for multiple concerns; three speakers share findings from developing frameworks to make packaging safer, account for tradeoffs, and reduce plastic packaging use; three speakers share how policy is developed at the United Nations and European Union
Study detects PFAS across US fast food restaurant packaging
Mind the Store campaign and Toxic-Free Future collect and test 29 food packaging samples from 6 US fast food chains for fluorine levels; find that burger wrappers and containers from McDonald’s and Burger King likely treated with per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS); paper bags used for French fries and deserts have consistently high fluorine levels