Food Packaging Contaminants

Food packaging prevents foods from spoiling and enables traceability, marketing, and sharing of information with customers. But chemicals from packaging can transfer into foodstuffs, a process known as migration, and this is also relevant for other food contact materials (like processing equipment). This article explains the concept of migration, details what conditions lead to increased migration (including the food packaging material types), discusses options for assessing migration, outlines global regulations for food packaging, and touches upon challenges related to food packaging in the circular economy, for example where packaging is reused or recycled, and where increased chemical contamination can occur.