IN Brief:
- FAO has published a report on food safety risks linked to recycled plastics and alternative food-contact materials.
- The report highlights chemical migration, feedstock contamination, additives, nanomaterials, and uneven regulatory frameworks.
- Food packaging sustainability is becoming inseparable from supplier assurance, materials validation, and food-contact safety.
FAO has called for stronger risk assessment of recycled plastics and alternative food-contact materials as the food packaging sector accelerates its shift towards recycled content, bio-based substrates, and new material systems.
The organisation’s report, Food safety implications of recycled plastics and alternative food contact materials, examines how packaging changes designed to reduce environmental impact can introduce new safety questions if material streams, decontamination processes, additives, and migration risks are not tightly controlled.
Recycled plastics sit at the centre of the report. Although less than 10% of plastic waste generated globally has been recycled to date, recycled content is expected to rise as governments, brands, retailers, and packaging suppliers pursue waste and circularity targets. For food-contact applications, that creates a more demanding technical brief than ordinary recycling. Feedstock quality, sorting, cleaning, decontamination, and chain-of-custody systems all affect whether a recycled material is suitable for direct or indirect food contact.
Alternative food-contact materials are also under scrutiny. Bio-based materials derived from sources such as corn, sugarcane, and cassava can introduce hazards linked to pesticides, natural toxins, allergens, or new intentionally added substances. Nanomaterials used to improve performance, extend shelf life, or enable active packaging functions require their own safety evaluation.
The report places packaging sustainability firmly inside food safety management. A pack still has to protect the product, maintain shelf life, prevent contamination, and remain chemically suitable for its intended use. A material that performs well in end-of-life terms can still create risk if it fails under real filling, heating, chilling, storage, or distribution conditions.
That tension has been building across the sector. IN Food’s March analysis, Distilled: Packaging rules meet production reality, examined how EPR costs, DRS preparation, PFAS restrictions, bisphenol controls, and recycled-content accounting were pushing food manufacturers towards faster packaging decisions. FAO’s report adds the safety layer that sits beneath those decisions: specification changes need evidence, not only recyclability data or carbon claims.
Food manufacturers are now being asked to reduce virgin plastic, increase recycled content, remove chemicals of concern, simplify end-of-life pathways, and preserve affordability. At the same time, packaging has to maintain barrier performance, seal integrity, print quality, machine runnability, product protection, and legal compliance. Those demands can conflict, particularly where a new material behaves differently on existing lines or under established shelf-life conditions.
The practical burden is likely to fall across packaging development, quality, technical, procurement, and regulatory teams. Recycled-content claims need supplier evidence and traceability. Food-contact suitability needs migration data and application-specific assessment. Alternative materials need scrutiny of raw material origin, coatings, additives, and performance across the conditions in which the pack will actually be used.
Cross-border supply adds another layer. Packaging supply chains are international, but food-contact material rules remain uneven between markets. A material accepted in one jurisdiction may require additional testing, documentation, or approval elsewhere. FAO expects the report to inform discussions at Codex Alimentarius, where global food standards are developed to support safety and trade.
The direction of travel is clear enough. Circular packaging cannot be managed as a procurement exercise alone, and recycled or alternative materials cannot be judged only by their sustainability profile. The strongest projects will be those that treat material validation, supplier data, migration risk, and line performance as connected parts of the same decision.
As recycled and alternative food-contact materials move further into mainstream production, safety assessment is becoming part of the cost of circularity. Packaging systems that can prove both environmental and food safety performance will have the clearest path into scaled manufacturing.
