ASSESSMENT OF CONTAMINANTS RESPONSIBLE FOR ODOR GENERATION IN INDIAN FOOD PACKAGING PAPERS & BOARDS

Abstract

Food packages play an important role in protecting the food from external contamination & preserving the foods quality without affecting its contents. Paper & boards are one of the main sources of food packaging all over the world. The use of paper & boards is promoted not only by economic factors but also by the ban on single-use plastic & growing environmental awareness. Traditionally, the paper industry has been highly reliant on forest-based resources for its production. However, with the increased demand for paper-based products & the shortage of forest-based resources, the industries are also utilizing various alternatives like the agro-residues for substituting the conventionally used wood-based raw materials. The composition of the fibrous raw materials used in paper industries varies depending on various factors like the climatic conditions, the air, water, as well as soil quality in which they are grown. It in turn affects the content of odor-generating compounds present in them like the amount of unsaturated fatty acids, the heavy metal content, etc. Moreover, depending on the production process & the storage conditions, the produced food packaging papers & boards are also exposed to numerous compounds that may cause packaging to become a source of contamination. This may affect the odor properties of the food packages & cause major financial loss to the food packaging industries. It also makes them highly unacceptable by the customers. To prevent the use of such contaminated & odorous food packages, the European Commission has established certain regulations that aim for consumer protection & food safety. Article 2 of its Council Directive (89/109/EEC) states that the food packages must not transfer their components into the food products that could endanger human health & unacceptably change the food composition or deteriorate its taste & odor. Thus, the present investigation aimed to firstly identify the various contaminants that are responsible for odor generation in food packages, secondly to perform laboratory-scale experiments to verify the mechanism responsible for this odor generation, & thirdly to utilize odor-reducing compounds to determine how the odor could be reduced by the treatment process. The experimental procedure essentially consisted of the following five steps. a) The commonly available paper & board-based food packages were collected from cafeterias, restaurants, food joints, & college canteens where the people generally visit to consume outside food items. ii b) The fiber furnish, fiber morphology, & the physical strength properties of the food packages were studied to determine the raw material composition. c) The various contaminants like the unsaturated fatty acids, heavy metals, enzymes, & odorous VOCs (volatile organic compounds) that are mainly responsible for odor generation were determined in the food packages. d) The preliminary & confirmatory experiments were performed in the laboratory by simulating the conditions for odor generation with the help of compounds that are responsible for odor generation. e) Various odor-reducing compounds were utilized to reduce the generation of odorous VOCs in the food packages.