Welcome to Food Fraud Advisors. We are food safety, quality and compliance experts with decades of experience in the Australian food industry. We are passionate about preventing food fraud. A safe, authentic food supply is our aim. We provide solutions to food businesses. Learn more about who we are and what we do by clicking on the menu buttons. And get in touch with us today. We love to help.
When the big boys get it wrong…
Coles has been caught breaching its own sustainable fish sourcing policy by selling yellow fin tuna. Yellow fin tuna is classified as ‘near threatened’ by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature and Natural resources and generally considered to be a fish species that cannot be sustainably fished right now.
After being caught selling the home brand canned yellow fin tuna by journalists from Fairfax Media last week, Coles reported that those particular cans of tuna were from a certified sustainable fishery in the Maldives where the population of yellow fin is ‘doing really well’. It looks to me like Coles relied on the Marine Stewardship Council certification rather than cross-checking the species sections of their own sourcing policy.
Coles has more regulatory, purchasing and compliance resources than just about any other food business in Australia. So if they occasionally make mistakes in their policies and procedures, what hope have smaller businesses got?
Authenticity vs regulatory compliance vs safety; the snake wine perspective
Anyone for some snake wine? According to Brady Ng of Munchies, a good snake wine should taste like a meal in a shot glass. Snake wine is made by drowning a live snake in a vessel of strongly alcoholic rice wine, often accompanied by herbs and spices or smaller reptiles like geckos.
The video below went viral this week as western viewers shared their shock and horror at the cruelty involved in producing the beverage which is popular in Vietnam, Korea and China. Leaving aside the issues of animal cruelty, here at Food Fraud Advisors we were asking these questions:
Is the snake wine in this video authentic? Sure looks like it! Authenticity depends solely on how the finished product is marketed, so provided that the seller does not claim it was made with cobra and special rice wine if it really contains a plain old garden python and cheap grain alcohol, it could be considered ‘authentic’. Read more about authenticity here.
Is the snake wine in this video legal? Perhaps. Its manufacturing methods may breach laws about endangered species and animal cruelty, and I can’t make any comment on whether it complies with the local liquor excise laws and taxes, but the finished product itself probably meets basic food safety laws in most of South East Asia.
Is the snake wine in this video safe to drink? Probably. The alcohol in the wine denatures any venom in the snake and does a great job of controlling any microbial hazards. And I’m told a well-aged snake wine tastes pretty good. Just make sure the snake is truly dead before you open the bottle, or you could meet the same fate as this woman in China.
Authentic Food versus Safe Food
Food authenticity is utterly dependent on the way a food is marketed or presented. A piece of meat sitting on a plate is just a piece of meat until someone tells you something about it; is it organic? is it free-range? grass-fed? hormone-free? It is only after a product has been described in some way that authenticity becomes relevant. Authentic food is food (or drink) that is what it is claimed to be. Simple! Or is it? Read more about food authenticity here.
Safe food is safe to eat and it’s as simple as that. It doesn’t matter how the food is described or sold, whether it’s horse meat or venison or giraffe, if it’s safe to eat then it’s safe to eat. Simple! …. well pretty simple anyway… read more about safe food here.
Why should I care about food fraud?
We care about food fraud
… because Aussie farmers who work hard to grow top quality specialty products suffer huge losses each time someone fraudulently passes off an inauthentic product as their own. Read the story of East Gippsland farmer Peter Treasure whose Wuk Wuk brand beef has been exploited here.
…. because of Cheznye Emmons who was 23 when she died after drinking fake gin in Sumatra. Read her story here.
… because your customers care about it.