Fresh fruit guide

Fresh fruit guide

SUMMARY

Introduction. P. 3

Apricot. P. 45

Blueberry. P. 61

Fig. Page 73

Cherry. Page 85

Plum. Page 98

Sloe. Page 112

Raspberry. Page 121

Strawberry. Page 132

Pomegranate. Page 147

Currant. Page 161

FIG. Page 172

Lime. Page 185

Lemon. Page 194

Tangerine. Page 202

Apple. Page 218

Peach. Page 234

Cantaloupe. Page 245

Quince. Page 259

Blackberry. Page 270

Orange. Page 281

Medlar. Page 303

Pear. Page 316

Pineapple. Page 324

Banana. Page 334

Grapefruit. Page 345

Watermelon. Page 363

Grape. Page 373

Bibliography . Page 413

Introduction

The right to food, from its origins, has evolved based on everyday knowledge, personal experiences and prevailing ideas. On many occasions, food hygiene issues were subject to deep religious beliefs that were turned into law.

Throughout history, the different authorities have been concerned mainly with adulterations and food fraud. The need to protect citizens from harm derived from these behaviors is not an invention of modern society. The Babylonian Code of Hammurabi already sanctioned, about 4,000 years ago, food adulterations.

Towards a new food order

The health of the simple consumer was taken into account only in the case of acute toxicity risk. Over time, and since the fourteenth century, the different corporations that have been formed throughout history have set themselves rules applicable to the products made by their members.

At the end of the 17th century, the so-called fraudulent practices were prohibited, establishing a series of controls on products. Over the years, and already at the end of the 18th century, considered as the beginnings of modern science, a collective feeling arises at the level of the States that determines the design and development of a broad system of social defense that also includes the food sector.

At that time the regulations were more and more precise and they were concerned about food control. This determines the need to have effective legal means for its application. And it is that at the end of the 18th century, the modern postulates that had to be taken into account by the norms of protection for the citizen were, among others, prevention and security. At that moment a new stage began.

The right to consumer protection: something closer

At the beginning of the 19th century, the well-known Constitution of Cádiz of 1812 attributed to the City Councils the so-called health police. Other later regulations gave them the function of ensuring the quality of food of all kinds. Throughout that century, the public health of food was linked, fundamentally, to two sectors of administrative action: agriculture and health.

The Ministry of Development and the Ministry of the Interior have traditionally been in charge of these powers. The first health administration was imposed by the General Health Law of 1855, and provided that in each judicial district there would be three Subdelegates, one for Medicine and Surgery, another for Pharmacy and another for Veterinary Medicine, although their functions were not fully established until early 20th century. The municipalities were required to provide veterinary services, which should be responsible for the recognition of meat and animals destined for food in the neighborhood, as well as the recognition of imported cattle and reports and care related to epizootics.

At this time, between the 19th century and the beginning of the 20th century, different governments issued different regulations in which they indicated the conditions that food should have so that they did not harm or alter the health of consumers, establishing at the same time a hygienic monitoring by experts in the field.

Thus, laboratories were instituted in most capital cities, whose main function was to uncover cases of food fraud and whose staff was dedicated to inspecting establishments where food products were supplied. The consumer could also submit food samples to determine whether or not they were fit for consumption.

The Royal Order of January 5, 1887, relating to the inspection of food, established the need to monitor, check and analyze food, urging the responsibility of the authorities in this matter and recommending to the City Councils the establishment of chemical laboratories municipalities for food analysis.

In addition, it was necessary to determine the substances that were harmful to the health of consumers. Some examples of the provisions that were issued are clearly illustrative:

Royal Orders of December 9, 1891 and September 13, 1900, referring to the absolute prohibition of the use of copper salts for the greening of canned food.

Royal Order of April 3, 1889, prohibiting the use of saccharin and similar substances in food and beverages, and considering it only as medicine.

Regulation for the application of the Royal Decree of March 11, 1892, issuing provisions to prevent the adulteration of wines and alcoholic beverages.

However, legislation was clearly weak when it came to food safety, adulterations and counterfeits. The regulations that were dictated were, most of the times, as a consequence of the claims of the citizens. Food safety legislation differed from the current state of knowledge and, in addition, it was scarce, little known and dispersed, to the point that many times it was necessary to compile it by some entity or body.

In the 1914 publication Food and Beverage Hygiene. Easy measures to recognize their adulterations and counterfeits Dr. J. Madrid Moreno already stated: Commerce can be free, but it cannot violate public health by knowingly dispensing harmful substances. If adulterations and counterfeits are committed by any, changing a component by another, should thus be announced to the public. If this were fulfilled everywhere, surely many manufacturers would not have benefited so much, selling articles in whose preparation foreign substances enter and whose composition is unknown, since the same consumers would have been in charge of discrediting them .

All of this makes us think that until the 20th century little attention was paid to the safety of food supplies, considering that it was a matter that required strictly local control.

A recent right, on the modern side.

Despite its historical antecedents, there is no doubt that food law is a recent, modern law that has evolved rapidly to adapt to new knowledge in science, the expansion of markets, demographic changes and new developments. current consumer expectations.

The context in which food law must be applied and, more specifically, food security, is dominated by economic globalization, the circulation and consumption of the most varied products, and the globalization of the food market; as well as the change of habits and needs on the part of the consumer, the introduction of new foods and food products and the industrialization-technification of the food production process.

To date, food law has been a highly normative right that has regulated all phases of food production, from primary activity, through the entire food chain, to making the food available to the final consumer.

In this sense, it has regulated, among other issues, the choice of raw materials, their treatment, the handling, definition and composition of products, industrial food hygiene, materials in contact with food, procedures for conservation; as well as the presentation, labeling and advertising of food. And, of course, it has also provided itself with forceful mechanisms from the orbit of criminal responsibility to act against fraud, even in situations of risk to people's health.

Crimes against public health are regulated, in the Penal Code approved by LO 10/95 of November 23, in Title XVII of Book II, which is headed Of crimes against collective security. This Title is divided into four chapters in response to the different ways in which the protected legal asset can be attacked. Thus, Chapter I regulates crimes of catastrophic risk (arts. 341 to 350), Chapter II of fires (arts. 351 to 358), Chapter III of crimes against public health (arts. 359 to 378) and Chapter IV of crimes against road safety (arts. 379 to 385ter).

In relation to the protected legal right, that is, collective security, we find a reference in the Statement of Motives of the 1992 CP Project in that it established that the idea of security, in all groups, is given because crimes are configured of danger, concrete or abstract, which, in all cases, put the life or health of an indeterminate generality of people at risk .

On the other hand, the types of this Title are generally determined by a particularly serious infraction of provisions of an administrative nature, which motivates its repression in the criminal sphere. From the foregoing it follows that most types of the Title are configured as blank criminal types.

Substances harmful to health and chemicals. Regulated in arts. 359 and 360 CP punish the elaboration, dispatch, supply or trade of these substances when they can wreak havoc, including an attenuated type in the case of carrying out the same conduct being authorized for the traffic of said substances, but not complying with the formalities provided for in its regulations. regulatory.

The art. 363 establishes a type characterized in that the active subject is a producer, distributor or merchant who offers, manufactures, elaborates or hides food or harmful products or performs any other of the conducts contained in the precept. In any case, the essential element is the fact that such behaviors pose a danger to consumers. As a crime of danger, it is consumed with the mere activity in which, generally, the sale is not required (STS March 10, 1992). The reference to the contest of art. 77 CP in case of injurious result. For its part, art. 364 punishes the assumption of adulteration of food, beverages or substances destined for the food trade, when this is likely to cause damage to health.

Animals intended for human consumption. As a novelty, the new Code punishes in the second section of art. 364 the putting into circulation of animals or products derived from them that have been treated with substances that may generate a risk to human health. This type is configured as an assumption of a blank criminal law in which the referral to RD 1,904 / 93, of October 29, on sanitary conditions of products of animal origin is basic.

Poisoning or adulteration of water or food substances. Punishes art. 365 poisoning or adulteration with food substances intended for public use or consumption.

Complementary sanctioning measures. It has the art. 366 the possibility, for all the previous articles, of closing the establishment, factory, laboratory or premises for a period of up to five years and, in extremely serious cases and in accordance with art. 129 CP the final closure may be decreed.

Reckless Modalities. By ministry of art. 12 CP, art. 367 punishes the reckless commission of these crimes with a penalty lower in degree.

Complementary penalties. Without prejudice to the disqualification penalties expressly established for each crime, art. 362 collects in a generic way the penalty of special disqualification for employment or public office, profession or trade, industry or commerce for the subjects referred to in said precept, imposing the penalty of absolute disqualification in the case of authority or agent thereof ( See art. 24 CP). The last paragraph establishes the consideration, for criminal purposes, of the physician.

Consumers need effective norms and means to defend their interests and protect their rights against food fraud. The legal control of those fraudulent behaviors in the food sector requires specialized police forces adapted to the social, economic and technological reality of our days.

Despite the technological, scientific, legal and educational advances developed during the 20th century in the food sector, a certain number of food poisonings continue to occur, as well as fraudulent behaviors that can threaten the health of consumers.

According to the data provided by a not very old rigorous study, carried out by the French Agency for Food Safety, in collaboration with a group of experts from a private institute of researchers, and which has become known, they conclude that in France they are produced annually between 240,000 and 270,000 food poisoning. It also highlights that the number of deaths from these poisonings is between 228 and 691 people a year, especially the elderly, children and people with weakened immune systems.

The consumer is increasingly removed from the selection and preparation of food, so he depends for his supply of the complex agri-food industry. A situation that in certain circumstances has led to a certain distrust of the consuming public that has spread not only towards those subjects that intervene in the entire food chain, but also towards the public powers, in charge of controlling that food is safe. The most worrying issue is none other than the appearance of new risks, still little known to science, and that as in the case of mad cows have an incubation period of up to 30 years, whose nature makes them incompatible with any current legal protection.

The prosecution of those criminal behaviors that threaten the health of consumers has always been present in the texts of our criminal legislation, although new modalities have been incorporated to adapt to the needs of each moment. One of the most notorious was the one that occurred in 1983 after the events motivated by the toxic syndrome. This situation evidenced what had been widely denounced by most experts: the deficient criminal protection of the consumer in the field of food fraud.

In Spain there are police forces that have specialized in the fight against food fraud. SEPRONA (Service for the Protection of Nature), dependent on the General Directorate of the Civil Guard, has acted forcefully in the field of sanitary laws, and in fields related to human food, animal nutrition and the use of pesticides. The activity of this special service is intense, according to their reports.

The saying do not give a hoot could summarize one of the most recurrent concerns for both consumers and administrations, but also for manufacturers and producers in the food sector, who must be very strict when verifying the purity of the raw materials they use. In addition to constituting an economic fraud, adulterations pose a serious risk to the health of consumers, since the food can contain harmful substances or generate them when behaving in unexpected ways. Also undeclared allergenic elements in adulterated food endanger the sensitive consumer.

For all these reasons, the detection of adulterations at all levels of the chain is one of the areas in which food safety is always alert and works actively. One of the most frequently adulterated foods has been olive oil. Its high price means that, on occasions, it can be subjected to mixtures with other oils, such as seed oils, which are not legally allowed and which lower its cost, but with possible negative consequences for health. In addition to their sensory peculiarities being altered in the mixture, the different oils behave differently when faced with heat treatments, depending on their origin. Allergic reactions caused by undeclared substances in food are also possible. This is the case of soybean oil,

A research group at the University of Alcalá, in Madrid, has developed an analytical procedure by capillary electrophoresis, a separation technique based on the different mass / charge ratio of the molecules, which for the first time proposes a betaine as a marker of adulterations in olive oils with seed oils. As explained by those responsible, betaines are minor compounds of the oil while, traditionally, detection procedures have been studied with groups of major compounds, such as fatty acids, lipids or sterols.

For its part, the Department of Chemical Engineering of the Faculty of Chemical Sciences of the Complutense University of Madrid has developed two methods to detect the adulteration of extra virgin olive oil with other lower quality vegetable oils, such as sunflower oil, corn , refined from olive and pomace.

In Spain, one of the most tragic cases of adulteration in the world olive oil sector took place, known as the toxic oil syndrome or rapeseed oil syndrome, which caused more than a thousand deaths and affected thousands of people. Years later, its fatal consequences are still being suffered. One aspect stands out: there was a before and after in the field of food safety. From that moment on, the true potential of food toxicity in public health was realized and the necessary means, both economic and human, began to be used to avoid any similar situation in the future. Today, oils are one of the most controlled foods in terms of quality and purity.

The development of DNA-based techniques is one of the examples of how technology has evolved in the service of preventing food fraud. In the UK, the Food Standard Agency (FSA) ran an authenticity program on food labeling to be accurate and not mislead.

The Food Standards Agency (FSA) has a primary