News

The Food Standards Agency has published the results of its 2025 testing programme.

They conclude that most of the food tested was safe and authentic, but the survey did reveal some labelling and authenticity failures in Dubai-style chocolate and goat meat products.   The programme targets areas of known or potential risk. Between July and December 2025, 845 products were sampled from national supermarkets, independent retailers and online sellers.  

Dubai-style chocolate 

Only one of the 45 samples of Dubai-style chocolate passed every test and labelling requirement, a finding that prompted the FSA to issue consumer warnings before Christmas 2025.  

Labelling issues were found in 42 of the 45 samples. These included incorrect or missing use-by and best-before dates, allergens not clearly highlighted, ingredients not listed in the correct order and lack of UK importer details. 

Goat meat 

Of the 40 goat meat samples tested, 20 contained only sheep. Another sample contained a mix of sheep and goat meat, and a further sample was found to be wholly deer.    

Slush-ice drinks 

The survey uncovered on-going issues with a small number of slush ice drinks, particularly around glycerol levels and use of glycerol warning posters in shops. 

The programme was delivered in partnership by the three Local Authority Official Food and Feed Laboratories (OLs) and two private OLs in England and Wales. 

A permenant link to the report has been added to FAN's searchable Research database.

The EC Monthly Reports of Agri-Food Fraud Suspicions reports are a useful tool for estimating fraud incidents, signposted on FAN’s Reports page.  They can be found here.

FAN produces rolling 3-month graphical analysis. In order to show consistent trends we have excluded cases which appear to be unauthorised sale but no intent to mislead consumers of the content/ingredients of a food pack (e.g. unapproved food additives, novel foods), we have excluded unauthorised health claims on supplements, and we have excluded residues and contaminants above legal limits.  We have grouped the remaining incidents into crude categories.  Our analysis is subjective, intended only to give a high-level overview. 

One clear signal in July is the (unwelcome) return of undeclared dyes and colours - the large purple bubble top-centre of the chart.  3 of these cases are Sudan dyes in spices, an issue that has been bubbling for over 20 years.  But 3 are relatively new - green dye in pistachio paste, which is linked to the current regulatory watch-out of Dubai chocolate.

Our main takeaway message continues to be that industry risk-assessment too often focusses on specific ingredients as "high risk".  In actual fact, it is the TYPE of fraud that is consistent; falsification of traceability or health documents/certification, illegal import, bulking out more expensive ingredients with cheaper ones.  The affected ingredients or products vary.  This suggests that risk assessment should focus more on motivation and opportunity in the supply chain, and less on "counting RASFFs".

The EC Monthly reports are only one source of information.  A comparison of the many different information sources now available is given in an earlier blog this week.