Declaring Allergens in Raw Plastic Materials

A question to see how everyone else is handling this situation. We are a supplier of packaging materials for the aerosol food industry. Primarily injection molded components. Recently we have started asking for allergen declarations from our suppliers. We have run across a few suppliers who have indicated an additive used to produce the plastic pellets we use for molding may contain soy. Has anyone else run across this and how have you handled the notification to customers?

Probably soybean oil.  Allergens are the proteins in the food products.  If the soybean oil is adequately refined, there should not be a significant amount of soy protein.  Your supplier should confirm this.

Hello

I the past allergen input are often ignored which might be present/coming with packaging, lubricants etc. - food grade means also none or known allergen input by such materials. Whether this information is important has to be assessed by the FBO which has to imform the consumers on allergenic risks.

An example from the past on BSE risk transfer:

bood bags where coated e.g. with Ca-stearate as anti-sticking agent inside (some other substances like starch derivatives were used too). Ca-stearate can be produced from several fats, of vegetable or animal source. Animal can be e.g. cows,. At the beginning of the BSE story this contamination was ignored and/or not assessed because the user (blood banks) were not aware about this anti-sticking agent and the supplier does not see the risk.

This might demonstrate the responsibilty of the whole chain for safety of products and the importance of market surveillance and qualified comminication between supplier and customers.

Rgds

moskito

Yes, have and happening now, it depends on how it is used - highly refined oil should not present an issue.  Current client is having a issue with soy based ink - the allergen is present, however no way of migrating or leaching to product.