Food fraud vulnerability assessment: Towards a global consensus on procedures to manage and mitigate food fraud

Abstract

BackgroundFood fraud represents a risk to the food industry and food business operators are required to conduct a food fraud vulnerability assessment to be in compliance with GFSI requirements. There is currently no globally-recognized standardized process for food fraud mitigation and some food business operators have found meeting the requirements to be challenging. Scope and approachThis work summarizes the main aspects of publicly-available food fraud vulnerability assessment (FFVA) tools and resources, describes the general FFVA process based on a consensus of the previous work, and highlights gaps in this process that should be addressed. Key findings and conclusionsThe main gaps identified were: appropriately grouping and prioritizing products/ingredients, evaluating the vulnerability of multi-component finished products, collecting and evaluating supporting data, evaluating potential public health and economic impacts, resource constraints among small/medium-sized companies and in developing countries, understanding and creating standards for analytical detection methods for fraud, and evaluating fraud vulnerability in food packaging.This work can support discussions at a global level that may eventually lead to a consensus process for a FFVA, for example, those conducted under the auspices of the Codex Alimentarius Commission.