Food ingredients manufacturers have made clear their displeasure of the European Food Safety Authority’s (EFSA) controls around novel food applications. This comes as the European Commission is readying to evaluate the organisation.
EU Speciality Food Ingredients (EUSFI), a federation representing more than 200 international ingredients companies, has called on the European Commission to make bold changes following its review of EFSA, the first since its creation in 2002.
The group says the European Commission now has the responsibility to ensure EFSA performs risk assessments efficiently and proportionately. It claims urgent measures that recognise Europe’s speciality ingredients sector as valuable partners in a competitive international market are needed.
The evaluation will cover three key areas, including EFSA pre-submission advice, the potential to modify EFSA’s mandate, and whether EFSA’s framework should be updated.
A Commission report will be sent to the European Parliament and Council by March 2026, following the review.
“This is a unique opportunity to foster a cutting-edge and safe speciality food ingredient sector that enhances the global competitiveness and excellence of the European food and beverage industry,” EUSFI wrote.
EFSA authorisation process
Speciality food ingredients, which includes the likes of vitamins, fibres and other additives, are used across the food and beverage sector for their nutritional or technological qualities.
Prior to use, most are required to undergo a premarket authorisation process, which includes an EFSA safety assessment.
More speciality ingredients are entering the market as societal and nutritional demands increasingly evolve, requiring significant resource from ingredients manufacturers during the approvals process.
“Submitting a novel food ingredient application to EFSA has become overly complex,” argues EUFSI.
Budget and resources to submit applications have doubled, it claims. The intake phase has also significantly increased from 30 days to a staggering seven months.
Innovative companies can spend between 3% and 8% of annual turnover on research and development, and a period of four to 10 years. It can cost between €2m and €3m to develop speciality food ingredients, with an additional €1m to €3m needed to market with the health claim.
Though there is a need for a simpler process, the ingredients sector and consumers still require the protection of approved status, argues Boris Hokadel, founder of the wellness brand Feel.
What protects the ingredients makers?
“If an ingredient is novel, we tend to avoid the trouble,” he says. “But when seeking food approvals, the system could be easier,” he adds, explaining it shouldn’t be too easy for makers to gain approval as there are a lot of “cowboy brands” out there looking to make quick money.
This gives the wider industry a bad name, as it’s usually the bigger and medium-sized players that face the brunt of the authorities' wrath, Hokadel says.
Though the sector argues the current system is far from adequate. “The risk assessment is influenced by ever-changing factors, such as numerous inquiries about well-built applications caused by experts’ limited understanding of food technology and production, not in line with real-world settings of ingredients’ development and production, especially at a pilot scale,” EUFSI writes.
EU ingredients businesses are “increasingly sceptical” of the value provided by an EU novel food application, perceiving them as “a waste of money and effort”.
But, ingredients manufacturers have set out a series of improvements that could be made to EFSA systems:
- Revamp – EFSA needs to have better interaction with the applicants, with direct answers to applicants' questions and industry feedback
- Review – operational processes, including confidentiality procedures, must be simplified
- Strengthen – EFSA experts need to have better knowledge and understanding of food tech and legislation
- Priorities – resources should be focused on efficient risk assessment evaluation and not administrative operations
The European Commission was approached for comment.
