A scientific Knowledge Centre was officially launched in Strasbourg on Tuesday 13 March by the Joint Research Centre (JRC) of the European Commission. The aim is to boost the quality of foodstuffs and to combat fraudulent food practices in the European Union. This comes at the height of a scandal surrounding Veviba meat, which is hitting the headlines in Belgium.
Formed of a network within the Commission and its member states, this Knowledge Centre for Food Fraud and Quality has a dual purpose: to support EU policymakers and national authorities by providing access to, and sharing, up-to-date scientific knowledge; and to restore consumer confidence in the quality of food available to them on the market, in the interest of their health and the whole supply chain.
“Food is one area where science can very directly and tangibly demonstrate the benefits it brings to citizens”, said Tibor Navracsics, the commissioner responsible for the JRC.
According to Vera Jourova, the commissioner for consumer policy, “this newly created Knowledge Centre (...) will further contribute to collecting and processing science-based evidence”. She went on to add: “Its work will also contribute to developing a common testing methodology, which in turn will help us apply and enforce food and consumer protection laws”.
It will be up to the centre to coordinate market surveillance work on the composition and sensory properties of foodstuffs offered under the same packaging and branding on several markets across the EU, in order to combat double standards in the quality of foodstuffs pointed to by eastern countries.
The centre should also: - use an early warning and information system on food fraud, for instance by passing on such information to the general public and by ensuring media monitoring; - link the member states’ information systems to that of the Commission (such as databases describing the composition of certain high value agri-food products, such as wine or olive oil); - and generate country-specific knowledge, for example by mapping the competencies and laboratory infrastructures in the different EU member states. (Original version in French by Aminata Niang)