The Food Standards Agency and Food Standards Scotland have published their joint Food Crime Strategic Assessment (FCSA) for 2024.
The FCSA supports the protection of consumers and the reputation of the UK food and drink industry through the following strategic objectives:
● Setting out a current assessment of the threats posed to the UK food system from food crime
● Identifying opportunities to detect, tackle and prevent food crime
● Taking a collaborative approach with local authorities, regulators and law enforcement agencies
● Alerting the UK food and drink sector to the threat of food crime and how it could impact on their supply chains
Specific threats identified and discussed include:
● Misrepresentation of red meat and poultry, with regards to status, origin or durability date
● Waste diversion, including links to Animal By-Products (ABP) handling within red meat and poultry supply chains
● The servicing of consumer demand for culturally preferred products through the slaughter, unlawful processing or importation of lamb and pork
● Authenticity challenges in the supply chains of commodities posing notable or persistent fraud risks to UK consumers arising from upstream, overseas adulteration and misrepresentation
There are areas of clear change from the assessment of 2020, including a significant reduction in the entry of illicitly gathered shellfish into the UK food chain (likely driven by changes to exports after EU Exit) and the rise in the retail availability of a broad spectrum of illicit imports in the UK, referred to as ‘grey market goods’. UK responsibilities for enforcing 2,4-dinitrophenol (DNP) prohibition now sits with the police rather than food agencies, but this ongoing risk is also discussed
The servicing of consumer demand for specific, culturally preferred products, mainly relating to meat, both through illicit domestic production and through importation, remains a prominent theme, presenting in several different forms.
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