Food Packaging Enterprise Should Pay Attention to Environmental Requirements for

A few days ago, Germany announced a recall from Belgium of importing frozen thin noodles, the main reason is that the printing ink of the noodles packaging contains benzophenones and migrates to the noodles causing noodles polluted. The detected content of the benzophenones is 1747 ug/kg, however the limit of benzophenones in printing ink of European Commission regulations 2009 used by food contact materials must not exceed 600 ug/kg.

Printing inks used in almost all the food packaging, but there are a lot of poisonous and harmful chemicals in printing inks which may cause chemicals migration and pollute the contents of food.

Some progress has been made by our country about the research on environmental problems of printing ink in 2007 and two directive standards have been already published. These two standards clearly lay down the limiting composition and harmful material limit of printing ink. However, the environmental safety problems triggered by printing ink still can not be ignored. Since these standards are voluntary standards, adopting these standards will greatly improve the cost, therefore, part of the enterprise still use the old standard and technology in production process.

Department of inspection and quarantine reminds the food packaging export enterprise: Make sure the importing country of food packaging and organize production according to the importing country requirements. Choose printing ink meeting the environmental standards as possible to prevent poisonous and harmful elements from printing ink migrating to the food and from causing food contamination. Strengthen the contact with the inspection and quarantine agencies and comprehend all food packaging evolution in time.