The PACKSAFE project, whose theme is “Strategy for an integrated chemical safety of packaging materials in contact with food”, funded by the National Research Agency (ANR) and on which the toxicology laboratory collaborates, was very recently the subject of an article published in the journal “Cahiers de Nutrition et de Dietetique”.
Risk assessment of Non-Intentionally Added Substances (NIAS) in packaging in contact with food, and which may migrate into food, is a major challenge for packagers, food processors, evaluators and risk managers. The article presents the strategy developed in the project, which consists of combining analytical tools with in silico and in vitro studies, allowing the identification of the danger in a complex mixture (extract/migration of packaging). The aim is to avoid the presence of undesirable, chemically uncharacterised or even unknown substances in the food. This approach seems all the more essential and relevant in a circular economy context, where the share of bio-based, reusable and recycled materials will increase considerably in the coming years, the traceability of these new materials being, for the most part, difficult at this point in time.