EFSA's database has been updated, as have its accompanying documents. 1301 additional processing studies were taken into account with this update. The current version of the EFSA database now considers a total of 2152 processing studies, resulting in 2104 median processing factors ("median PF's"). As new representative processing techniques, for example, the production of palm oil and palm kernel oil, the extraction of sugar from sugar cane and the production of sake from rice as well as other processed products were included.
Processing factors are used to describe changes in residue levels from the agricultural crop ("raw commodity") to the processed product caused by processing. The database contains processing factors that originate from processing studies that have to be submitted by the applicants (plant protection product manufacturers) as part of the authorisation of plant protection products. They thus originate from model trials and often do not correspond to the actual processing process and/or the actual processing conditions. Therefore, they are only to be regarded as aids. The Food Federation Germany still considers a comparison with the actual processing process and/or the actual processing conditions to be indispensable if processing factors from such studies are used to assess the marketability of foods. EFSA's database has now been updated, as have its accompanying documents. This was reported by EFSA in the External Scientific Report "First update of the EU database of processing factors for pesticide residues", which was written by the German Federal Institute for Risk Assessment (BfR) (EFSA supporting publication 2022:EN-7453). According to the BfR Scientific Report, 1301 additional processing studies were taken into account with this update. For the first version of the database, only studies submitted to EFSA by 30 June 2016 were considered. Now, more recent studies have also been taken into account, as well as studies submitted to BfR as part of the zonal authorisation procedure. As with the first version of the database, all newly included studies were subjected to a "quality check". As a result, the current version of the EFSA database on processing factors for pesticide residues now considers a total of 2152 processing studies, resulting in 2104 median processing factors ("median PF's") that are considered "acceptable" or "indicative". In the compendium of representative processing techniques, for example, the production of palm oil and palm kernel oil, the extraction of sugar from sugar cane and the production of sake from rice were included. Other processed products have also been included in the database, such as cooked broccoli, cauliflower, celery and leeks, as well as cooked lentils and chickpeas. Composite foods (such as bread, pasta, chocolate, ketchup) were not included in the database, as here the recipe of the products would have to be considered in addition to processing factors. Pulp/peel trials for product types with edible peel were also not included, as it is assumed in the risk assessment that the peel is also consumed.
Source: Lebensmittelverband, Rundschreiben L-672-2022
