Publicação
Adulteration of foods from animal origin: consumer perception about food labelling and Spectroscopic methods for detection of fresh food adulteration
| Resumo: | Consumers have become more and more demanding in their meat and fish consumption, in terms of quality, safety, and the origin of the products they consume. Today, consumers attribute great value to the information on food labels, this is, the indication of the ingredients and about the production processes applied to the final product. The identification and authentication of food have an important role in the healthy diet of consumers. There is a need to develop fast and efficient techniques to detect food adulteration and reestablish consumer confidence in food manufacturers. There is an increasing interest in methods based on spectroscopic techniques, because they offer several advantages, this is, and they are powerful tools for conducting adulteration tests. One of the objectives of this study was not only to identify important labelling aspects that consumers would examine at the time of purchasing, but also to determine opinions and the knowledge about adulteration of food products. To understand the usefulness of the information provided for consumers, a survey was carried out to assess the efficacy of the information presented in food labelling. The Kruskal-Wallis and Spearman test and descriptive analytical tools were used to analyse data. Principal Component Analysis (PCA) was performed to obtain a smaller number of uncorrelated factors regarding the usefulness of food labelling, regarding the confidence of information displayed in food label and perception of food fraud. Results showed consumers usually do not read food labels due to lack of time and excessive information. Additionally, food labelling was observed to be more useful for specific consumer groups, such as, athletes, consumers with health conditions or consumers concerned with a healthy lifestyle. The respondents consider that information displayed in food label is useful, but the way the information is presented may decrease the consumer interest. The level of education, a healthy lifestyle, and practising sport were factors which influenced the opinion of consumers regarding food labelling. Regarding respondents´ confidence on foodstuffs, over half of them stated that information provided in food label is reliable. However, a lack of confidence on food composition is observed in those processed foodstuffs such as meat products. Food fraud is recognized by over half of respondents with a higher perception of those practices that implies a risk to public health than those related to economic motivation. Age and consumers’ education revealed the most important socio-demographic factors regarding food label perception, confidence on its information and also knowledge about food fraud. The results of the present study highlight the need of information campaigns by public health authorities to show the importance and advantages of reading food labels as well as ensuring food labels with essential information which are not only quickly and clearly seen but also understood by consumers. Thus, implementation of education programs to increase consumer knowledge about food labelling and fraud is essential. Since scarce research is available about consumer perceptions about food label information and food fraud, the respondents´ perceptions observed in the current work could be used as guidelines by food industry to improve food label design to enhance the consumer understand and usefulness. The potential of the Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) in tandem with chemometric methods such as PCA, Partial Least Squares Regression (PLS-R) and Partial Least Squares Discriminant Analysis (PLS-DA) in detecting the presence/absence of adulteration of fallow deer meat (Dama dama) (D) with goat meat (Capra aegagrus hircus) (G) and Atlantic salmon (SS) with Onconrhynchus mykiss (OM) was studied not only for fresh samples but also for samples stored for different storage periods. The PCA model was able to describe the studied adulteration by using four principal components with a variance of 95%. PCA showed that the absorbance in the spectral region from 1138 to 1180, 1314 to 1477,1535 to 1556 and from 1728 to 1759 cm-1 may have been attributed to biochemical fingerprints related to adulteration used in the differentiation of fallow deer and goat meat. Furthermore, the absorbance in the spectral region of 721, 1097, 1370, 1464, 1655, 2805 to 2935, 3009 cm-1 may have been attributed to biochemical fingerprints related to adulteration and used in the differentiation of the SS and OM. The PLS-DA and PLS-R model predicted the presence/absence of adulteration in meat and fish samples of an external set with high accuracy. |
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| Autores principais: | Moreira, Maria João Pinho |
| Assunto: | Fresh Food Fraud |
| Ano: | 2019 |
| País: | Portugal |
| Tipo de documento: | tese de doutoramento |
| Tipo de acesso: | acesso aberto |
| Instituição associada: | Universidade de Trás-os-Montes e Alto Douro |
| Idioma: | inglês |
| Origem: | Repositório da UTAD |
| Resumo: | Consumers have become more and more demanding in their meat and fish consumption, in terms of quality, safety, and the origin of the products they consume. Today, consumers attribute great value to the information on food labels, this is, the indication of the ingredients and about the production processes applied to the final product. The identification and authentication of food have an important role in the healthy diet of consumers. There is a need to develop fast and efficient techniques to detect food adulteration and reestablish consumer confidence in food manufacturers. There is an increasing interest in methods based on spectroscopic techniques, because they offer several advantages, this is, and they are powerful tools for conducting adulteration tests. One of the objectives of this study was not only to identify important labelling aspects that consumers would examine at the time of purchasing, but also to determine opinions and the knowledge about adulteration of food products. To understand the usefulness of the information provided for consumers, a survey was carried out to assess the efficacy of the information presented in food labelling. The Kruskal-Wallis and Spearman test and descriptive analytical tools were used to analyse data. Principal Component Analysis (PCA) was performed to obtain a smaller number of uncorrelated factors regarding the usefulness of food labelling, regarding the confidence of information displayed in food label and perception of food fraud. Results showed consumers usually do not read food labels due to lack of time and excessive information. Additionally, food labelling was observed to be more useful for specific consumer groups, such as, athletes, consumers with health conditions or consumers concerned with a healthy lifestyle. The respondents consider that information displayed in food label is useful, but the way the information is presented may decrease the consumer interest. The level of education, a healthy lifestyle, and practising sport were factors which influenced the opinion of consumers regarding food labelling. Regarding respondents´ confidence on foodstuffs, over half of them stated that information provided in food label is reliable. However, a lack of confidence on food composition is observed in those processed foodstuffs such as meat products. Food fraud is recognized by over half of respondents with a higher perception of those practices that implies a risk to public health than those related to economic motivation. Age and consumers’ education revealed the most important socio-demographic factors regarding food label perception, confidence on its information and also knowledge about food fraud. The results of the present study highlight the need of information campaigns by public health authorities to show the importance and advantages of reading food labels as well as ensuring food labels with essential information which are not only quickly and clearly seen but also understood by consumers. Thus, implementation of education programs to increase consumer knowledge about food labelling and fraud is essential. Since scarce research is available about consumer perceptions about food label information and food fraud, the respondents´ perceptions observed in the current work could be used as guidelines by food industry to improve food label design to enhance the consumer understand and usefulness. The potential of the Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) in tandem with chemometric methods such as PCA, Partial Least Squares Regression (PLS-R) and Partial Least Squares Discriminant Analysis (PLS-DA) in detecting the presence/absence of adulteration of fallow deer meat (Dama dama) (D) with goat meat (Capra aegagrus hircus) (G) and Atlantic salmon (SS) with Onconrhynchus mykiss (OM) was studied not only for fresh samples but also for samples stored for different storage periods. The PCA model was able to describe the studied adulteration by using four principal components with a variance of 95%. PCA showed that the absorbance in the spectral region from 1138 to 1180, 1314 to 1477,1535 to 1556 and from 1728 to 1759 cm-1 may have been attributed to biochemical fingerprints related to adulteration used in the differentiation of fallow deer and goat meat. Furthermore, the absorbance in the spectral region of 721, 1097, 1370, 1464, 1655, 2805 to 2935, 3009 cm-1 may have been attributed to biochemical fingerprints related to adulteration and used in the differentiation of the SS and OM. The PLS-DA and PLS-R model predicted the presence/absence of adulteration in meat and fish samples of an external set with high accuracy. |
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