The season of new potatoes from Salento has started. "Quality is good, though only average yields per hectare and grades are not very high. We mainly grow the Sieglinde variety in our area - one of the cultivars most suitable for cooking and very popular in northern European countries. The harvesting of Pdo new potatoes from Galatina is also going well. Packaging and distribution will start in a few days' time," explains Francesco Romano, manager at Ro.Gr.An.
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Other varieties are Annabele, Inova, Spunta and Exquisita, which develops an excellent flavour thanks to the red soil and mild temperatures of south Salento.
As Ro.Gr.An cares about market dynamics and the search for packaging materials free from chemical components, in 2018 it will start placing its potatoes in jute sacks treated with natural soya oil (and not with mineral oils deriving from MOSH/MOAH) certified by a small label that reads "food grade".
According to the consulenza-qualita.com website, MOSH (Mineral Oil Saturated Hydrocarbons) are typically made up of linear and branched alkanes as well as alkyl-replaced cycloalkanes. MOAH (Mineral Oil Aromatic Hydrocarbons) represent the hydrocarbon category with 1 to 4 aromatic rings. They are a wider and more complex group with respect to MOSH, but mainly include alkyl-replaced polyaromatic hydrocarbons.
Recent studies conducted by BfR (German Federal Institute for Risk Assessment) showed that such components are often found in some packaged foods that are in direct or indirect contact with cardboard made using recycled paper fibres. The main reason behind the transfer of MOAH and MOSH to food would therefore be attributable to secondary packaging, not yet addressed exhaustively by Community and national regulations.
There are currently no official EU regulations defining minimum and maximum MOAH and MOSH levels. However, some reference values such as those defined by JECFA (Joint FAO/WHO Committee on Food Additives) can be considered official sources. They established the ADI (Acceptable Daily Intake) value at 0.01 mg/kg.
"Starting from this year, many supermarkets in Germany will analyse packaging to assess whether it corresponds to the standards established by domestic and Community regulations to avoid contamination."
In addition, Romano talks about a new branding for wooden crates inspired by more natural colours as well as about a change in the paper used to protect the produce from the light. "Most of the produce commercialised by Ro.Gr.An holds the GlobalGap Grasp certification and is grown in red soil near the sea, so the potatoes have the perfect iodine content for human consumption."