ORGANIC QUAL TRACERS · Organic food quality control and metabolomic fingerprinting
Horizon 2020 — Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions
- Duration
- 2016-06-03 → 2018-06-02
- EU contribution
- €170,122
- Participants
- 1
- Scheme
- MSCA-IF-EF-ST
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Results in brief
Organic food quality control and metabolomic fingerprinting
In the last decade, the consumption trend of organic food has increased dramatically worldwide. However, based on the literature reviewed, the legislative framework has not kept up with this market expansion, being necessary a further standardization of analytical chemical methods to support the accreditation bodies. The lack of reliable markers for the discrimination between organic and conventional products makes this market susceptible to attempted fraud. The Commission Regulation in a recent report (Regulations (EC) No 848/2018) has highlighted the need for greater cooperation between industry, Government, enforcement agencies, consumer groups and organizations. Besides, sampling procedures, efficiency of analysis on crop leaves as well as drift processes have also to be clarified. The “ORGANIC QUAL TRACERS” project comes in response to the key requirement for solving the authentication challenges in the organic-food sector, especially in organic vegetables as they are the pioneering products in Europe. The results obtained with this proposal means an advance in one of the main challenges of EU society (productive and sustainable agriculture), and they contribute to the objectives set out in the Horizon 2020 Strategy “A strategy for smart, sustainable and inclusive growth”, improving the credibility among consumers towards organic products, thus facilitating a continuous growth of EU organic food markets. The project has confirmed the utility of the new state-of-the-art techniques in mass spectrometry analysis (IRMS and HRMS), in combination with chemometric analysis, to improve information (qualitative/quantitative) in both food control safety/quality and their application to organic products. It has offered analytical approaches to (i) obtain wide-ranging information about contaminants, (ii) determine natural components and (iii) establish (dis)similarities between products.
Data: CORDIS, © European Union
Project objective
In the last decade, the production and consumption of organic food has increased dramatically worldwide. The EU organic food market generates a turnover of more than 22 billion € with a total of approximately 11 million ha and 250,000 farms (2013). However, based on the literature reviewed, neither internal supply nor the legislative framework has kept up with this market expansion, been necessary a further harmonisation of methodology in data collection. On the other hand, the lack of reliable markers for the discrimination between organic and conventional products makes this market susceptible to attempted fraud. The Commission Regulation in a recent report (No 889/2008) highlights the need for greater cooperation between industry, Government, enforcement agencies, consumer groups and organisations. In this context, the project proposes to confirm the utility of the new state-of-the-art techniques in mass spectrometry analysis (IRMS and HRMS), in combination with MSA, to improve information (qualitative/quantitative) in both food control safety and quality and their application to organic products. It will offer analytical approaches to (i) obtain wide-ranging information about contaminants, (ii) determine natural components and (iii) establish (dis)similarities between products. The “ORGANIC QUAL TRACERS” project comes in response to the key requirement for solving the authentication challenges in the organic-food sector, especially in organic vegetables as they are the pioneering products in Europe. The proposal offers a contribution to the objectives set out in the Horizon 2020 Strategy (“A strategy for smart, sustainable and inclusive growth”).
Original text from CORDIS.
Participants
- UNIVERSIDAD DE ALMERIA · ALMERIACoordinatorSpain
Links
Data: CORDIS, © European Union