PFAS in food: is getting harder to swallow

PFAS, also nicknamed forever chemicals, have regularly made the headlines since the Forever Pollution project, a unique cross-border investigative journalism effort, revealed their ubiquitous presence across the continent in 2023. As a result, the European Union acknowledged that stronger regulation of those chemicals is needed at the source.

While regulatory discussions about the industrial and consumer uses of PFAS has picked up through the ongoing preparation of a ‘universal’ restriction at the European Chemicals Agency (ECHA), the regulatory gaps affecting the food on our plates have received far less attention. Addressing PFAS in food is urgently needed according to foodwatch and two recent regulatory initiatives provide signals that this problem can no longer be ignored.

PFAS are a large family of over 10,000 chemicals that have gained popularity across industry sectors over the last decades due to their extremely persistent and stable properties (which they owe to their very strong carbon-fluorine bonds). PFAS are unique due to their combination of three properties: high persistence in the environment (they do not degrade), their ability to accumulate (in the environment and in organisms) and their mobility (they can travel very far away from emission sources, e.g. in pristine areas).  

PFAS have been used as stain- and water-repellent surfactants in a myriad of industrial and consumer uses ranging from food packaging, industry machinery and lubricants, paints, cosmetics, apparel, electronics, airspace, defense, cars, firefighting foams, food processing… They can also be used for agricultural purposes when integrated in pesticides to ‘boost’ the active substances and make them more persistent in the environment.

PFAS can enter our food through environmental contamination, for instance when the cultivated soils or the water used to water them are contaminated. This can also happen when PFAS pesticides are used for farming purposes on crops. One main other channel is the leaching of PFAS chemicals that are used in the food production and processing .chain through the so-called food contact materials (conveyor belts in the food industry; food packaging coated with PFAS).

The problem with PFAS is twofold: on the one hand, they are now ubiquitous in our environments (soil, waters, air) and our bodies - we are all contaminated with PFAS, including newborns and continued production means ever increasing concentrations. On the other hand, some of the most studied PFAS have been linked to a series of serious health effects, including cancer, reproductive disorders, disruption of the good functioning of the hormonal system and of our immune system.

Taken together, these elements all point to the urgent need to decrease PFAS emissions at the source to reduce environmental, food, and human contamination.

At the time of writing this article, the EU-wide regulatory measures on PFAS are piecemeal, concerning only a few PFAS substances for a few specific uses, and they are not significant enough to prevent PFAS from entering our food.

The two most well-known and studied PFAS (PFOS and PFOA) are banned internationally. Other PFAS subgroups are restricted in industrial settings – such as the use of firefighting foams. A broad cross-sectoral restriction covering all PFAS for several industrial and consumer uses is currently in discussion at the European Chemicals Agency (ECHA) and is not expected to be adopted before mid or end of 2027. One of its important loopholes is that it does not cover the use of PFAS in pesticides, which fall under another regulation than industrial chemicals.

However, two very recent regulatory initiatives signal a change in trends in relation to the significance of PFAS contamination of our food and the urgent need to address it.

First, as of 12th August 2026, the use of PFAS for food packaging is severely restricted. With the application of the new EU-wide regulation on packaging and waste (the Packaging and Packaging Waste Regulation, PPWR), it is no longer possible for companies to use PFAS in the processing and production of food wraps and boxes above certain limits – irrespective of the material used (plastic, paper etc). This is a significant milestone that illustrates that regulators admit that PFAS contamination via packaging is a problem for our food and that it needs to stop.

Second, in July 2026, the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) reduced the safe level of Trifluoroacetic acid (TFA) in the diet by 3.5 times, from 0,05 to 0,014 mg per kg bw per day. TFA is a common breakdown product of PFAS (or metabolite), and the use of PFAS in pesticides is an important contributor to its release in our environment (water, crops). What does this EFSA move mean? It means that TFA levels in our food need to be reduced out of potential health concerns. Indeed the agency based its opinion on recent evidence of potential impacts on the good functioning of our thyroid gland.

And this is not anecdotal. It follows the classification of TFA by the European Chemicals Agency (ECHA) as a presumed substance toxic for reproduction (category 1B) in June 2026. The agency particularly highlighted the potential risks for the unborn child and for fertility.

Opponents of stricter PFAS regulation have previously argued that TFA's presence in the environment is not a problem per se. But the official confirmation of its health risks, combined with the lower safety threshold for food, adds further urgency to regulate PFAS in pesticides more strictly.

The contamination of our food by PFAS is a reality that is becoming impossible for regulators to ignore. While foodwatch supports ongoing regulatory efforts to reduce industrial emissions of PFAS, we also demand further measures to monitor and minimise PFAS levels in food and therefore increase consumer protection.

Currently, there are only legally binding maximum levels for few PFAS in few food items. While the recent EFSA lowering of the acceptable level of PFAS breakdown product TFA sends clear signal that the intake of TFA via food must be reduced, this is far from being enough in order to monitor PFAS in food. Under the current laws, there are still no maximum levels for all PFAS (TFA) in all food products. These legal limits are absolutely necessary to better protect consumers from those substances in everyday food items.

Finally, the use of PFAS in pesticides must be strictly reduced. While pesticides are not included in the universal restriction in development for industrial PFAS, the pesticides regulation currently does not allow to restrict all those PFAS in a comprehensive and swift way. Yet, reducing the use of PFAS pesticides is critical to reduce the emissions of PFAS and TFA, reduce the contamination of our food and therefore better protect consumers from their potential effects.

As part of the broad civil society efforts to drastically reduce PFAS emissions, foodwatch is committed to advocating and campaigning for strict European regulations to get PFAS out of our plates.