66 | October• 2018
THE FOOD DETECTIVES
while its Criminal Assets Bureau
coniscates criminal cash and assets.
“International gangs are mov-
ing away from running drugs and
firearms [and moving] into illicit
trade because the rewards are great,
andiftheydogetcaughttheyhave
lesschanceofgoingtoprisonfor
20years,”saysMichaelEllis,afood
crimeconsultantwhountil2016
managed Interpol’s illicit trade and
anti-counterfeit crime directorate.
“hat’swhyweneedinternational
coordination to stop them. More and
more governments and enforcement
agencies have realised that this is
notavictimlesscrime.Itisharming
societies, harming economies and,
frankly, killing people.”
AccordingtotheWorldHealthOr-
ganization (WHO), the Czech Repub-
lic, Poland, Norway and Estonia are
amongagroupofcountriesplagued
by deaths and organ damage from al-
cohol containing methanol. WHO re-
portsthat“thesizeoftheseoutbreaks
ranges from 20 to over 800 victims
withfatalityratesofover30percent.”
Methanol,acheapalcoholused
in industrial applications and anti-
freeze, is highly toxic when ingested.
Dozensdiedinaspateofpoisonings
in the Czech Republic in 2012 that
were attributed to vodka and rum
taintedwithmethanol and sold at
markets and kiosks.The Appliance of Science
The challenges facing investigators
arecompoundedbythecomplexity
of today’s food supply chain.
“We don’t know anymore where
what we eat comes from,” says
ProfessorChrisElliott,whoin2013
founded the Institute for Global FoodSecurity at Queen’s University Belfast
in Northern Ireland.
Itscutting-edgelaboratorycan
analyse the molecularingerprint of
food against a library of thousands of
species proiles collected by Elliott’s
teamfromallovertheworld.Itholds
2000samplesofricealone.
Behind steel, bomb-proofed doors
thatprotecttheoutsideworldfrom
thetoxinstheyworkon,Elliott’steam
of 40 focuses on developing anti-food
fraud technologies for use by govern-
ment agencies and investigators.
“Manyreadymealscontainup
to 50 ingredients, and food supply
chains are so complex that each“THISISNOTAVICTIMLESSCRIME.
IT ISHARMING SOCIETIES,HARMING
ECONOMIES ANDKILLING PEOPLE”