Risk Assessment of Food Allergens – Part 5: Review and establish threshold levels for specific tree nuts (Brazil nut, macadamia nut or Queensland nut, pine nut), soy, celery, lupin, mustard, buckwheat and oats

FAO; WHO;

Risk Assessment of Food Allergens – Part 5: Review and establish threshold levels for specific tree nuts (Brazil nut, macadamia nut or Queensland nut, pine nut), soy, celery, lupin, mustard, buckwheat and oats

Meeting report

Year of publication 2023

Place of publication Rome, Italy ;

Pages 48 p.

Author FAO; WHO;

Publisher FAO ; WHO ;

Product type Book (series)

ISBN 978-92-5-138283-7

Series title Food Safety and Quality Series

Series number No. 23

Full item page

Synopsis (short abstract) In Part 2 of the Ad hoc Joint FAO/WHO Expert Consultation on Risk Assessment of Food Allergens, reference doses (RfDs) were recommended for the global priority allergens, which included: walnut (and pecan), cashew (and pistachio), almond, peanut, egg, hazelnut, wheat, fish, shrimp, milk and sesame. Still, RfDs were not recommended for a number of regional or national priority allergens as they did not meet the criteria to be global priority allergens. In an additional request, the Codex Committee on Food Labelling (CCFL) indicated interest in potential RfD derivation for the following specific food allergens: specific tree nuts (Brazil nut, macadamia nut or Queensland nut, pine nut), soy, celery, lupin, mustard, buckwheat, and oats. An overview of the available data and recommended RfDs (or reasons no RfD could be derived) are given here for these specific food allergens. These RfDs were derived following the guidelines described in Part 2 of the Ad hoc Joint FAO/WHO Expert Consultation for deriving an RfD for priority allergenic foods. Details of the available data and discussions of the Expert Committee are presented in this report.

Cite this content as:

FAO & WHO. 2023. Risk Assessment of Food Allergens – Part 5: Review and establish threshold levels for specific tree nuts (Brazil nut, macadamia nut or Queensland nut, pine nut), soy, celery, lupin, mustard, buckwheat, and oats. Meeting report. Food Safety and Quality Series, No. 23. Rome.

https://doi.org/10.4060/cc8387en

Language English

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Knowledge of thresholds constitutes a critical requirement to assessing the risk from allergens, as they are a characteristic of the hazard that allergens present to the food-allergic population. FAO and WHO reconvened the Ad hoc Joint FAO/WHO Expert Consultation on Risk Assessment of Food Allergens for a second meeting to provide scientific advice on review and establish threshold levels in foods for the priority allergens. The expert committee concurred that the benchmark dose/probabilistic hazard assessment approach aligned most closely with the requests of the Codex Committees. After extensive discussion, the expert committee reached a consensus on reference doses (RfD) for priority allergenic foods, meeting the criterion for HBGV that they should reflect a range of exposure without appreciable health risk.
Document

Ad hoc Joint FAO/WHO Expert Consultation on Risk Assessment of Food Allergens. Part 2: Review and establish threshold levels in foods of the priority allergens. Virtual follow-up meeting on milk and sesame. Summary and conclusions.
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FAO and WHO reconvened a third meeting to review and evaluate the evidence in support of precautionary allergen labelling to address unintended allergen presence in foods. The Expert Committee at the third meeting reviewed the data on the current status and uses of the precautionary allergen labelling (PAL) and unanimously agreed that current PAL systems used in many countries needed to be improved as they were neither uniform nor informative and were not consistently risk based on amount and frequency of UAP found in food products. The Expert Committee also found that current PAL approaches led to widespread PAL that diminished information and value for consumers. The Expert Committee reviewed again the principles and basis of RfD from the second meeting and reached a consensus that the RfD for each priority allergen, as described by the HBGV and safety objectives, was a valid risk assessment endpoint for determining when sporadic or unexpected UAP posed more than appreciable risk to consumers and needed to be communicated to consumers by PAL.