GFSI Pushes Food Fraud Mitigation Requirements

By Sam Lewis

Believing it is an integral part of a food maker’s food safety management system, the GFSI board has decided to include food fraud mitigation requirements in the next revision of its Guidance Document. This will be the seventh edition of the Guidance and is expected in early 2016

Moving forward with its plans to better food safety on a global level, the Global Food Safety Initiative’s (GFSI) board has decided to include fraud mitigation requirements in its next, full revision of it Guidance Document. This will require companies to complete assessments of food fraud susceptibility, as well create a vulnerability control plan to minimize those weaknesses.

The board at GFSI is also supporting Safe Supply of Affordable Food Everywhere (SSAFE). This will develop plans for companies to assess how to control food fraud susceptibility both internally and in the supply chain. The board hopes this will be available prior to the release of the seventh edition of the Guidance Document so food makers can prepare before the requirements are made effective.

The Food Fraud Think Tank, sponsored by GFSI, examined and made suggestions how food companies can bolster food safety management systems. Included in the Think Tank are Eurofins and The Food Fraud Initiative at Michigan State University. Representing manufactures and food retailers were Danone, Walmart, and Royal Ahold.

Check out our guest column from MSU’s Douglas Moyer on food fraud and food defense

Recommendations from the Think Tank to bolster food safety management systems include: a Food Fraud Vulnerability Assessment — where supply chain data is collected and evaluated about ingredients, raw materials, products, and packaging, to determine and rank food fraud vulnerabilities. The Think Tank also recommends applying control measures to be implemented. These will also aid in reducing the risk of food fraud. Measures include monitoring and testing strategies, verifying origins of raw materials and ingredients, and supplier audits.

Last year, the Board of Directors at GFSI asked the group working on the seventh edition of its Guidance Document to work with the Think Tank to cover food fraud mitigation. According to the group, food fraud — deliberate substitution, addition, tampering, or misrepresentation of food, food ingredients, or food packaging, or false or misleading statements made about a product for economic gain — is an on-going and major concern. “Unlike food defense, which protects against tampering with intent to harm, the consumers’ health, risk of food fraud often occurs through negligence or lack of knowledge on the fraudsters’ part and can be more dangerous than traditional food safety risks because the contaminants are unconventional.”

Protect Your Brand: Ensure Food Safety And Compliance With A Quality Management System

Minimizing food fraud, along with the possible harm it brings to the public health, necessitates different viewpoints and sets of skills than food safety management and food defense. This is because traditional risk assessment doesn’t include economic problems or the history of food fraud. “Food fraud must be regarded as being a significant risk to human health, hence the involvement of the GFSI to facilitate with other industry bodies an agreed approach to mitigate this risk, says Cenk Gurol, a GFSI Board chair and VP of the food safety initiative at AEON.