Minutes of the FCMJEG 26th February 2025 meeting
Joint Expert Group on Food Contact Materials (FCMJEG)
Meeting of the FCMJEG at 10:00 on 26th of February 2025 Virtual via Microsoft Teams
Public Minutes
Present
|
Chair: |
Dr Sibylle Ermler |
|
JEG Members: |
Dr Emma Bradley Dr Gill Clare Dr Jenny Odum Dr Michael Walker Prof Shirley Price |
|
Food Standards Agency (FSA) Secretariat: |
Ms Jocelyn Frimpong-Manso - FSA Scientific Secretary Dr Rachel Kerr Ms Frederique Marie Uy Ms Sabrina Thomas Ms Azuka Aghadiuno Dr Gail Drummond |
|
FSA and other Officials: |
Mr Timothy Chandler Mr Vincent Greenwood Mr Allan Shivembe Mr Ian Smith Mr Adam Hardgrave Dr Tahmina Khan |
Contents
|
Item |
Topic |
Paragraph |
|
1 |
Welcome and apologies |
1 |
|
2 |
Conflict(s) of Interest |
2-3 |
|
3 |
Matters Arising Update on applications |
4-8 |
|
4 |
Minutes of the last meeting – 4th December 2024 |
9 |
|
5 |
Review of the draft Committee Advice Document (CAD) for a recycling process (RP1862) |
10-14 |
|
6 |
Review of the draft Committee Advice Document (CAD) for a recycling process (RP1702) |
15-18 |
|
7 |
Any Other Business
|
19-25 |
|
8 |
Assessment of an application for a plastic additive (RP2263) |
26-28 |
|
|
Date of the next meeting |
29 |
Item 1: Welcome and Apologies
1. The Chair welcomed all attendees to the meeting. Members of the FCMJEG introduced themselves to Professor Shirley Price who acts as the liaison between the Committee on Toxicity of Chemicals in Food, Consumer Products and the Environment (COT) and the JEGs. Apologies were received from Dr Stuart Adams.
Item 2: Conflict(s) of Interest
2. The Chair reminded those attending the meeting to declare any commercial or other interests they might have in any of the agenda items. It is necessary to declare interests, as per the Code of Practice for Scientific Advisory Committees (SAC) and Councils (CoPSAC, 2021). Members should ask themselves whether the public would reasonably consider that the interest in question might influence them (and thus their perceived independence).
3. Dr Emma Bradley declared a personal specific interest for Item 8 on the agenda, whereby her employer was the contract research organisation (CRO) that completed analytical testing for the Applicant. Due to her position, she reviewed the studies as part of quality assurance. She was therefore excluded from the discussions.
Item 3: Matters arising
4. The dossier update table with the overall progress of all FCM dossiers was presented to the FCMJEG Members. More detailed updates on the following dossiers/applications were given by the Secretariat: RP2229, RP2263 (discussed at this meeting), RP262, RP1415, RP2147, RP1862, RP1898.
5. Members were notified that both RP1702 (discussed at this meeting) and RP1741 had been presented to the Committee on Toxicity of Chemicals in Food, Consumer Products and the Environment (COT) and additional comments were made by the COT Chair that the FCMJEG Members were asked to resolve. Members had been reminded to provide comments on RP1741 by 8th February 2025.
6. The FCMJEG were informed that the following applications were signed off by the COT: RP45, RP94 and RP53.
7. The Secretariat confirmed that they had received communications from the Applicant for RP1415, and a response to a request for further information (RFI) had been received from the Applicant for RP1898, which will be presented at the April 2025 FCMJEG meeting.
8. The updated statement on abandoned environment plastic, including Ocean Bound Plastics (OBP) will be published on the FSA website shortly.
Item 4: Minutes of the last meeting – 4th of December 2024
9. The FCMJEG accepted the minutes as an accurate record of the meeting, subject to minor editorial changes.
Item 5: Review of the draft Committee Advice Document (CAD) for a plastic recycling process (RP1862)
10. No conflicts of interest were declared by the FCMJEG.
11. The FCMJEG were made aware that the draft Committee Advice Document (CAD) was reviewed by the COT at their meeting on the 4th of February 2025.
12. Comments received from the COT were relayed by the Secretariat with the assistance of Prof Price.
13. Several editorial amendments were also proposed.
14. The FCMJEG accepted these comments, and the updated draft will be cleared by Chair’s action.
Item 6: Review of the draft Committee Advice Document (CAD) for a plastic additive (RP1702)
15. The draft Committee Advice Document (CAD) and the Committee on Toxicity’s (COTs) comments were presented to the FCMJEG at the August 2024 meeting. The FCMJEG discussed the comments and amended the CAD. It was agreed that the CAD will be reviewed by the COT Chair via email correspondence following this meeting.
16. Members agreed there was not enough data to calculate the exposure to the additive in bottle-fed infants as well as many other uncertainties which had been considered. Hence it was agreed that bottle-fed infant exposure to the additive would not be included in the CAD.
17. The Secretariat will make the requested changes and provide an updated draft for review by the COT Chair.
Item 7: Any other business
Competent authority responsibilities relating to new EU Regulation on recycled plastic
18. Policy provided an update on the Competent Authority responsibilities under the Commission Regulation (EU) 2022/1616 (recycled plastic food contact materials). The FSA will shortly be required to carry out verification checks of individual recycling operators that have made an application to the EU. In parallel it will be establishing an auditing programme to facilitate the trade of recycled plastic onto the EU market.
Handling of Security Marked Documents
19. Members were reminded how to handle official documents securely and were informed that some training may be available to the FCMJEG. The FCMJEG were also reminded that there will be a second session of the toxicology training that will be provided by one of the FCMJEG members and will specifically be on genotoxicity testing.
20. The Group were informed that some members of the FCMJEG have served their full terms of office and following a recruitment campaign by the FSA there will be new members joining the FCMJEG once all the required checks have been made. The Group were also informed that a member of the FSA secretariat will be leaving, and their replacement is yet to be confirmed.
Future JEG meetings
21. The Members were informed that there will be no face-to-face FCMJEG meetings next year (2025-2026) due to budgeting constraints, and the Secretariat were reminded to update April 2025 agenda to being a virtual meeting.
Item 8: Assessment of an application for a plastic additive (RP2263) Cover paper
22. Due to the conflict of interest previously declared by Dr Emma Bradley (see paragraph 3), this item was moved to the last item in the agenda.
23. RP2263 was initially reviewed by the FCMJEG at the December 2024 meeting. At the present meeting, the Group reviewed the remaining sections of the dossier and the request for information (RFI) draft.
24. The Group made editorial recommendations on the RFI which will be finalised by the Secretariat before being issued to the Applicant.
Date of next meeting
25. The next meeting will be on the 9th of April 2025. This will be a virtual meeting on Microsoft Teams.