National official control plan for food additives and flavourings

The Ministry of Health has presented the National Official Control Plan (PNCU) of food additives and flavourings as raw materials and in foods including smoke flavourings 2025-2027.

The new plan , an integral part of the Multi-Year National Control Plan (Pcnp), replaces the previous 2020-2024 program, strengthening the verification of regulatory compliance and monitoring of consumer exposure.

The priorities of the PNCU 2025-2027

The new Plan, which replaces the previous one and is an integral part of the Pcnp, provides for an effective control system along the entire agri-food chain to verify compliance with the food and food safety regulations and to monitor consumer exposure to food additives and flavourings.

Following the analysis of the data obtained in previous years, the critical issues that emerged and the regulatory updates, the new Plan focuses on:

• food additives as raw materials;
• flavours as raw materials;
• smoke flavouring substances or “Smoke Flavours” as raw materials;
• food products containing food additives and/or flavourings.

The additives and flavourings to be monitored were selected based on their health profile and use in different food categories, with the aim of ensuring compliance with food safety regulations.

The strategic objectives of the plan

The objectives of the plan are to optimize information flows and communication between Regions, Autonomous Provinces and the Central Authority to promptly adapt control activities involving all operators, and to strengthen monitoring along the entire supply chain, from production to processing, up to packaging and storage of additives and flavorings, as well as their use.

Evaluation and monitoring of the Regions

The implementation of the plan by the Regions and Autonomous Provinces will be evaluated annually by the Compliance Verification Table (LEA Table) , according to the State-Regions agreement of 23 March 2005 (art. 12).

Therefore, for the purposes of implementing the obligations required by the food safety and veterinary information flows, each Region and autonomous Province must respect for the coverage criterion that the data are sent by the expected date and for the quality criterion that at least 95% of the minimum samples required are correctly entered into the NSIS -RADISAN system. (Source: https://www.vet33.it/ )