How Can Food Producers Overcome Packaging Migration Challenges?

By Jane Muncke, Ph.D., Managing Director, Food Packaging Forum Foundation

Brand owners have scarce information on food packaging’s chemical composition. However, they ultimately carry the risk of economic damage if the packaging turns out to be problematic.

In 2009, a major U.S. breakfast cereal brand made headlines because of migration from its packaging — 28 million boxes had to be recalled by Kellogg’s because methylnaphthalene migrated from the inner lining bag into Froot Loops, and other breakfast staples. The chemical migration led to consumers complaining to the FDA about off-taste, nausea, and illness. Apart from the brand damage and tons of spoiled food, this incidence also left an after-taste with food producers who rely on their suppliers for ensuring packaging safety.

Nestlé experienced something similar in 2005 that led the company to investing in in-house testing facilities ensuring supplier products were up to Nestlé’s own, internal quality standards (watch Nestlé’s Head of Packaging Quality and Safety discuss chemical safety). At the time, the world’s largest food producer had to deal with the photoinitiator isopropylthioxanthone (ITX) found in infant formula, and other products, in Italy at levels up to 600 ppb. ITX had been used in UV cured printing inks on beverage cartons, whereby curing time had been reduced at the packaging supplier’s plant. Subsequently, the uncured ITX made its way into the milk through set-off migration, where chemical substances transfer from the outside, printed layer to the inner food contact layer, and from there migrate into food. The economic damage was so large, that internal chemical monitoring of packaging became the norm for this brand owner.

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