Ireland was not the only state that raised concerns about an EU decision to phase out the flavourings used to add a smoky taste to meats, fish, cheese and snacks such as crisps, documents show.
To little fanfare at the time, in April 2024 the EU went ahead with a decision to end authorisation for several smoky food flavourings, over concerns about possible health impacts. The proposal from the European Commission was backed by a majority of member states, after the EU’s food safety authority concluded toxicity concerns about the flavourings were “either confirmed or can’t be ruled out”.
Rather than preparing food in a smokehouse, present day producers get the same smoky taste by purifying smoke and removing harmful components such as tar and ash, before the flavouring is added to food.
The food industry marshalled a significant lobbying campaign to encourage governments to push back against the proposed ban. In Ireland, then-minister for enterprise Simon Coveney told the commission that Irish producers had warned they would take a major economic hit and have to possibly pull “a wide range of products” from the market.
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Further records released to The Irish Times under the commission’s access to information rules show several other states also kicked up over the plans to phase out the flavourings.
Finland’s minister for agriculture Sari Essayah said the Finns had a “culinary and cultural preference for the smoky taste of foods”. Therefore, her country was “clearly in a different position” to other parts of Europe, she told Stella Kyriakides, then-EU commissioner for food safety, in a February 7th, 2024 letter.
The existing smoky flavourings were widely used in Finland and businesses had made “substantial” investments transitioning from traditional methods over recent decades, she said.
“We agree that within a reasonable time period the addition of smoke flavourings containing carcinogenic substances should be discontinued,” she said. However, it would take several years before the Finnish meat industry could possibly find ways to “further remove carcinogenic substances” from products. The minister suggested manufacturers should be given three to five years to replace the current flavourings with safer ones.
Minister for rural affairs in Sweden Peter Kullgren said his government had “deep concerns” about the flavourings being phased out and asked the commission to give businesses five to 10 years to adjust.
Kyriakides, who at the time was the EU commissioner from Cyprus, told ministers her main priority was “the safety of the food we eat” and the decision to phase out the flavourings was to protect the health of European citizens.
In a letter sent on April 2nd, 2024, then Norwegian health minister Ingvild Kjerkol also protested. “Consumers in many European countries, including Norway, seem to prefer a smoky flavour, originally imparted to food from smoke generated by combustion of wood,” she wrote.
While not in the EU, Norway follows food safety rules in the single market as a member of the European Economic Area. Kjerkol warned if the current flavourings were phased out food producers might be pushed to switch back to conventional smoking methods, which posed greater health risks. The change would be “costly and time consuming” for the industry, she said.
The Portuguese government said it accepted the need to phase out the flavouring method due to health concerns. Minister for agriculture Maria do Céu Antunes said the problem was what food producers would do instead. “The banning of these flavours raised a lot of concern within the food business operators, that for now don’t have a safe alternative,” she said in a letter last February.
Portuguese producers had indicated the only alternative would be to switch to traditional ways of smoking food, which would “lead to increased levels of substances harmful to human health”, she wrote. “It is very likely that the carcinogenic substances that were found in the smoke flavourings also exist in the same way, or even in a higher concentration, in the traditionally smoked foods.”
Poland also complained about the changes, echoing the talking points from industry that businesses might be forced to return to traditional smoking. Correspondence from Polish minister for agriculture Czesław Siekierski said the phasing out of existing smoky flavourings “would lead to severe socio-economic consequences”, given the scale of cold meat production in Poland. He objected to the ban and appealed for the commission to give businesses five to 10 years to phase out the flavourings.
In the end the commission gave food producers two years to phase out the current method for adding the smoky flavouring to crisps, sauces, soups and snacks, and a longer five-year window to stop using the method for flavouring ham, fish and cheese.
Industry sources say producers will be able to find a different additive to get a smoky or barbecue flavour in crisps and snacks. However, there is more uncertainty about how to replicate the same taste in meats and fish products, which means the food industry’s lobbying campaign is far from over.