Migration of phthalates from packaging and contact materials into foods: Review of models

Phthalate esters are organic compounds widely used as plasticisers due to their flexible and weak character. Exposure to phthalates (mainly via food ingestion) could cause a wide range of health and reproductive problems in people (e.g. disruption of the human endocrine system). Since phthalates are not covalently bound to the plastic polymer matrix, they can easily migrate from plasticised packaging and contact materials through diffusion, leaching or evaporation into food products. Migration of phthalates from packaging into food can be determined by conducting migration tests using food simulants, but these experiments are rather expensive and time-consuming. In accordance with Directive 2002/72/EC, mathematical models, based on physical processes like mass transfer, can be used as an alternative tool for estimating the migration of chemical substances. For that purpose, a number of software programs has been developed in the past (e.g. Migratest Lite, AKTS-SML,…). In this study, several software applications were reviewed regarding their performance for prediction of the migration of phthalates from packaging and contact materials into food products. The comparison was based on criteria like type of packaging material, suitability of the model for several phthalates, contact conditions (temperature, time,…), number of contact material layers that can be simulated, model validation for phthalates,… As a result, an integrated model that can predict the migration of phthalates from packaging and contact materials into food products will be developed. This model will be validated for phthalates by comparing the estimated phthalate concentrations with measured concentrations in foodstuffs.