CEN Issues Standards for Food Contact Plastics

SafeGuardSHardgoodsNovember 17, 2022

SG 130/22

CEN has issued Parts 2 and 3 to EN 1186:2022 on overall migration test methods for food contact plastics.

In Q3 of 2022, the European Committee for Standardization (Comité Européen de Normalisation, CEN) published two standards for the latest overall migration test methods in simulants for food contact plastics. These are:

EN 1186-2:2022 ‘Materials and articles in contact with foodstuffs – Plastics – Part 2: Test methods for overall migration in vegetable oils
EN 1186-3:2022 ‘Materials and articles in contact with foodstuffs – Plastics – Part 3: Test methods for overall migration in evaporable simulants

Highlights of these two new standards are summarized in Table 1

Materials and Articles in Contact with Foodstuffs – Plastics

Standard	EN 1186-2:2022	EN 1186-3:2022
Title	Test methods for overall migration in vegetable oils	Test methods for overall migration in evaporable simulants
European forward	Supersedes EN 1186:2002 Parts 2, 4, 6, 8, 10 and 12	Supersedes EN 1186:2002 Parts 3, 5, 7, 9, 14 and 15
European forward	Standard will be given the status of a national standard by January 2023 and conflicting national standards are to be withdrawn by this date at the very latest	Standard will be given the status of a national standard by February 2023 and conflicting national standards are to be withdrawn by this date at the very latest
Section 1 ‘Scope’	Methods for overall migration from food contact plastics with vegetable oils at temperature (T), 4 °C ≤ T ≤ 175 °C	Methods for overall migration from food contact plastics with food simulants at temperature (T), 4 °C ≤ T ≤ refluxing temperature
Section 4.1.1 ‘Test methods – Principle – General’	Test specimens are placed in a vegetable oil in test conditions chosen on the basis of worst-case scenario of use, by weighing test specimens before and after contact with vegetable oil, by dosing the oil absorbed by the materials by gas chromatography (GC) which is deduced from the obtained mass difference Specimens with retained absorbed oil extracted and determined by GC after conversion to methyl esters Triheptadecanoin as internal standard	Test specimens are placed in contact with food simulants in test conditions chosen on the basis of worst-case scenario of use by weighing the dry residue of the evaporated food simulant
Section 4.1.1 ‘Test methods – Principle – General’	Tests are carried out using one of the following methods: Total immersion Cell Fillable pouch Reverse pouch Filling a container	Tests are carried out using one of the following methods: Total immersion in conventional oven for tests between 4-100 °C or reflux Total immersion at reflux for tests at the boiling point of simulant and generally for short periods of time (up to 4 hours) Cell Fillable pouch Reverse pouch Filling a container
Section 4.6.2.4 ‘Migration calculation for materials in repeated contact with foodstuffs’	Reduction coefficients to be applied to each determination before calculating the mean of results
Section 4.7.3 ‘Analytical tolerances and precision’		2 mg/dm² or 12 mg/kg is acceptable for all evaporable food simulants

SGS technical experts have extensive knowledge and testing experience in materials and articles in contact with food. They work to ensure that your products meet the appropriate regulations for food contact materials, paving the way for compliance. From overall migration tests to expert advice on emerging regulations, compliance issues and documentation review, SGS is the partner to trust. In the end, it’s only trusted because it’s tested. Discover more on our website and read our brochure.

For enquiries, please contact:

Dr. Hingwo Tsang
Global Information and Innovation Manager
t: +852 2774 7420

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