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From pesticides to packaging materials, chemicals infiltrate the food system at every stage – from production to consumption – and have long been linked to a range of health concerns. Everything from fertilisers used on crops to materials involved in manufacturing can introduce synthetic chemicals into food, often without sufficient safety data. Tackling this challenge calls for a paradigm shift towards safer chemical design, innovative pest control, and sustainable packaging solutions. Harry Macpherson, senior associate for climate at Deep Science Ventures, discusses what the F&B industry needs to know about toxic chemicals.

Chemical toxicity is a pervasive and underestimated threat to human and planetary health, and it's deeply intertwined with our food system. Synthetic chemicals are ubiquitous in our modern world, present in the air we breathe, the water we drink and the food we eat. For the F&B industry, this presents a unique and urgent challenge that extends from the farm to the plate.

Our recent report, an eight-month analysis of peer-reviewed studies and expert interviews, concluded that the food system is a central point for many problems related to chemical toxicity. While the issues may seem daunting, they also present enormous opportunities for businesses to innovate and reduce the burden of toxicity on people and our environment.

The hidden dangers in our food

One of the most significant sources of toxicity in the food system is pesticides. These chemicals directly contribute to human health problems, with studies linking exposure to decreased sperm count and a lower probability of pregnancy in women undergoing fertility treatment. The impact isn't just on people; pesticides can have significant ecological effects too. A German study, for example, documented a 76% decline in flying insects in protected areas over 27 years, identifying pesticides as a primary cause. The widespread use of pesticides is a significant factor in wild bee population declines, which are critical for pollination in both natural ecosystems and agriculture.

PFAS: The 'forever chemicals'

Another well-known class of toxic pollutants is PFAS (per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances). Often dubbed 'forever chemicals,' certain PFAS compounds have been linked to numerous health issues, including cancer, reduced fertility, immune problems and obesity. An important characteristic of PFAS is their extreme persistence; they take a very long time to break down and, when they do, often degrade into smaller, even more persistent molecules.

It might come as a surprise that many pesticides sprayed directly onto crops are PFAS. Some break down into trifluoroacetic acid (TFA), a PFAS molecule that Germany’s chemical regulator recently classified as toxic to reproduction, very persistent, and very mobile. TFA's presence is growing, with recent findings of rapidly increased concentrations in wines and detection in 98% of tested British rivers.

A potentially surprising source of PFAS, toxic metals, pharmaceuticals and microplastics is the practice of spreading sewage sludge on fields as fertiliser. Due to contamination concerns, this practice has been phased out in the Netherlands, Switzerland and the US state of Maine.

The packaging problem

While the growing of food contributes to the burden of toxicity, the journey doesn't stop there. The transport, processing, packaging and cooking of food can also add to the problem through food contact materials. These materials are crucial because a large number of chemicals can migrate from them into food.

Research by the Food Packaging Forum shows that over 3,600 synthetic chemicals from food contact materials can be found in human bodies. Of these, 80 have been identified as having properties of high concern. Perhaps surprisingly, and 81% of chemicals in contact with food lack the necessary hazard data for safety prioritisation.

Well-known examples of toxic chemicals migrating from materials to food include the leaching of bisphenols like BPA and BPS from the linings of aluminium cans, micro- and nanoplastic contamination from plastic-lined coffee cups, and mineral oil hydrocarbons from paper and board packaging. Perhaps surprisingly, many of the chemicals which migrate from materials to food are not intentionally added.

A safer future

The most important action is to identify and create safer alternatives. We need a paradigm shift in how we create and use chemicals and materials for food, with chemical safety at the forefront. For the food and beverage industry, this means embracing innovation across the key interfaces where toxicity enters our food system.

On the horizon for eliminating toxicity from pesticides are opportunities to create solutions whose effects are limited to target species and which act locally in the field without transfer to the surrounding environment. Promising potential strategies may include mining nature and medicine to identify entirely new pesticidal approaches, joined-up thinking between crop development and pest controls and incentivising genetic diversity and resilience at the field level.

Eliminating toxicity from food contact materials will require improving our understanding of the causes of the problem with thorough monitoring of intentionally added and unintentionally added chemicals migrating into food, potentially using sensitive in vitro assays. There are also opportunities to replace today’s dominant non-degradable petrochemical plastics with degradable alternatives, and to construct food packaging and processing equipment from non-plastics where possible.

However, the move to degradable plastics must be accompanied by a move towards eliminating or creating safer plastic additives and the replacement of plastics requires improvements to the safety of paper and board, which are a less appreciated source of toxicity.