Food fraud – Intention, detection and management

Food fraud occurs when a food company intentionally deceive its customer about the quality and contents of the foods they are purchasing. While food fraud is often motivated by economic profit, some forms of food fraud can also pose a direct threat to the health of customers and consumers. Detecting food fraud is a challenge because consumers alone cannot detect them, and food fraudsters are usually innovative in the ways they avoid detection. In Asia and the Pacific, the risk of food fraud is estimated to be high, due to the high demand for premium quality food combined with an increasingly globalised food supply chain. This document describes the key aspects of food fraud, and discusses a set of measures that food safety authorities can take in order to stop the long-lasting problem of food fraud. Among these, legal interventions combined with technological developments seem to be promising tools in combatting the phenomenon. The authors suggest that the adoption of a definition of food fraud at the national level could support the identification of targeted actions, and that the alignment with Codex Alimentarius food standards can be of support to national food safety authorities in addressing the problem.