Answer given by Ms Kyriakides on behalf of the European Commission
18.11.2021
The functional class of food additives ‘emulsifiers’ includes substances which make it possible to form or maintain a homogenous mixture of two or more immiscible ingredients such as oil and water in a foodstuff[1]. Many foods as known today would not exist without the use of emulsifiers (e.g. margarine, mayonnaise, salad dressings, ice cream). Similarly to other additives, many emulsifiers are obtained from food sources, which are processed, refined and purified to obtain standardised products able to perform a technological effect in foods[2] (e.g. E 322 ‘lecithins’ obtained from eggs, soya, sunflower or E 471 ‘mono‐ and diglycerides of fatty acids’ consisting of fatty acids occurring in food oils and fats), others are produced synthetically or by fermentation.
Emulsifiers, as any other food additive, are subject to a premarket authorisation, which includes rigorous safety assessment. In addition, the legislation requires that food additives are kept under continuous observation. The Commission, together with the European Food Safety Authority, closely monitors new information on the authorised additives and may request that the safety of any food additive is re-evaluated at any time in the light of changing conditions of use or new scientific evidence available.
At present, the Commission does not consider that there are valid grounds to ban the use of emulsifiers or require any warning labelling linked with their use.
- [1] Definition of ‘emulsifiers’ as laid down in Annex I to Regulation (EC) No 1333/2008.
- [2] Article 3(2)(a) of Regulation (EC) No 1333/2008 defines ‘food additive’ as any substance not normally consumed as a food in itself and not normally used as a characteristic ingredient of food, whether or not it has nutritive value, the intentional addition of which to food for a technological purpose in the manufacture, processing, preparation, treatment, packaging, transport or storage of such food results, or may be reasonably expected to result, in it or its by-products becoming directly or indirectly a component of such foods.