APA News
-
Campaign to Stop Food Fraud
17 April 2014
Which? have launched a campaign to Stop Food Fraud following the results of an investigation into lamb takeaways sold in London and Birmingham. Which? bought 30 takeaways in Birmingham and 30 in London (15 lamb curries and 15 minced lamb kebabs in each location) and tested them for the presence of lamb, chicken, beef, pork, turkey, goat and horse DNA.
Read more -
Food fraud: the dangerous allergens lurking in the supply chain
16 April 2014
Former Public Analyst and APA Training officer Michael Walker who also acts as facilitator of Safefood's Food Allergy and Food Intolerance has co-authored an item in Guardian Professional highlighting the risks to allergy suffers due to food fraud.
Read more -
Edible Glitter Trial
16 April 2014
Public Analyst Chris Hunt gave extensive expert evidence during a three day trial before a District Judge at Leeds Magistrates’ Court in March 2014. Following a written verdict running to 20 pages a fine and costs totaling £13,515 were imposed on EdAble Art Limited and its proprietor for selling cupcake glitter, made of plastic normally used for drinks bottles, as an edible decoration.
Read more -
APA Conference 2014 Cambridge
08 April 2014
The APA President is pleased to announce that annual conference will be held on the 11th and 12th September 2014 in Cambridge. Cambridge is both a historic city and an inspiring locus for science today.
Read more -
Public Analysts enhance their expertise in DNA extraction for food authenticity testing
27 March 2014
In light of the recent horse meat scandal, the use of DNA technologies has been shown to be a powerful tool in combating food fraud and assuring food authenticity. A major factor influencing the performance of all DNA-based authenticity tests is extracting DNA of sufficient quantity and quality from a test sample. Many foodstuffs consist of mixed or complex ingredients and matrices which can cause problems when coming to extract DNA. To help address this issue, a Defra/FSA Knowledge Transfer (KT) event for Public Analysts (PA’s) and relevant stakeholders was developed and held at LGC (Teddington) on the Wednesday 5th March.
Read more -
Glasgow APA lab scoops gold at prestigous COSLA Excellence Awards event
18 March 2014
In an "Oscars" style ceremony attended by First Minister Alex Salmond and hosted by BBC Presenter Jackie Bird, Glasgow Scientific Services received one of the top awards at the recent Convention of Scottish Local Authorities (COSLA) Excellence Awards, The Gold award was in the category "Securing a Workforce for the Future". Glasgow's Chief Executive George Black who attended the ceremony said: "I'm immensely proud of this project and team which has been officially recognised for their innovative, inspirational and partnership working practice."
Read more
