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Since entering the EU, the Czech Agriculture and Food Inspection Authority (CAFIA) has a new obligation – to inspect irradiated food and to regularly inform the European Commission about the outcome of these inspections.

According to the Scientific Committee for Food, treating food and raw materials with ionising radiation is safer for consumers than other methods by which producers could protect their products against rapid deterioration. In spite of this, food irradiation is a sensitive issue, widely discussed by the public, and for this reason food must be labelled with the words “ionised”, “treated with ionisation”, or “treated with ionising radiation” so that consumers are clearly informed.

The CAFIA inspectors chose for the inspection of irradiated food such commodities that had already been detected as problematic either by other European supervisory bodies or they had been notified to the Rapid Alert System for Food and Feed (RASFF).

Twenty samples of spices, herbal teas, diet supplements, instant noodle soups and noodles were taken at producers, importers and sellers. According to the laboratory analysis results, two samples failed to comply with the relevant regulations because they were treated with ionisation, but this was not stated on the packaging, third sample – diet supplement Vital Alfalfa Extract was irradiated although the relevant regulations do not allow such practices. CAFIA notified this product to the RASFF.

During this inspection, the CAFIA cooperated with specialized German laboratory WEJ/Eurofins, Hamburg. Results of follow-up inspection will already be able to be obtained on the basis of analysis performed at CAFIA’s own laboratory in Prague. On recommendations of EC missions the laboratory was equipped with the latest up-to-date equipment for detecting irradiation across a much wider spectrum of food.

(Decree of the Ministry of Agriculture No. 133/2004 Coll., on the conditions of irradiating food and raw materials, on the maximum tolerable irradiation dose and on the method of indicating irradiation on the packaging can be found at www.szpi.gov.cz in the Legislation section).