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OCT. NOV. 2018 XI AT PAGE 28 IN THE PANTRY The protection of health comes from honesty The voice of those who work every day to safeguard our health, also through an assured diet, because free from any kind of fraud, it makes itself felt By Riccardo Sada “Operation N.A.S.” is a television program produced by Hangar for Discovery Italy. Broadcast on NOVE and dedicated to the operations of the Nuclei Antisofisticazioni e Sanità dell’Arma dei Carabinieri, this television series gives us the right opportunity to explore the theme of food in its specificity and its problems. After listening to the words of the N.A.S. Commander. Captain Dario Praturlon, of Rome, it is clear that the legislation that contrasts the phenomena of offences, in the food sector, over the last 20 years has suffered a strong decriminalization. Most of the sanctions, from criminal to administrative, have been reduced to adhere to European directives that are much less geared to punishing these crimes by choosing to punish them only through administrative proceedings. That is why today, those who commit food fraud are often only subject to the payment of a fine. I N.A.S. involve different Ministries related to their work, such as other police forces, particularly local, and investigative agencies to share and maximize their work. Deputy Inspector of Municipal Police in the Municipality of Monte Urano (Fermo), Piero Nuciari, for 37 years has been dealing mainly with commercial and hygienic-annonary controls. This work has allowed him to write several books on commercial and non-commercial matters, published both locally and nationally. Probably people are not aware of the existence of Food Fraud Squad at the Local Police. Can you explain how and when you operate? The Food Inspection Police in large cities has an ancient history that dates back even to Roman times. At the time, food (wine, oil, olives, honey and the like, with the exception of wheat) was transported in amphorae and not everyone will know that it was the shape of the amphora that identified the content. The amphorae with which the oil was transported, for example, were the forerunners of the shipping bill. The neck of these amphorae contained the weight of the amphorae, the name of the exporter, the weight of the oil contained, the name of the producer holding and of the owner. The most common scam was to sell food in amphorae with a filled or solid foot. This scam reached such great proportions that the Roman rulers were forced to create a corporation, the ‘Measurers’, a sort of food police that measured the quantity of amphorae offered for sale in the local markets, pouring their contents into the sample amphorae in their possession. In practice, they protected consumers by being ‘metric police’, one of the functions now performed by the municipal food police and the metric inspector of the Chamber of Commerce. It should be said that in general it is the large municipalities that have areas of food police with agents specializing in commercial controls and food hygiene. At most, in small municipalities, trading police checks are carried out, which are much simpler than food law checks. What is the food law check? The food law check is a rather complex activity because the person carrying out it needs to know the European, national and local regulations relating to the sector he is controlling. It is necessary to know the commercial regulations (European, national and local), the metric, veterinary, food, hygienic regulations, the techniques of food production (how a butcher’s shop, a food store, a bakery, an ice-cream shop, the fish shops, etc. work). and the main scams), the Haccp, the Consolidated Public Safety Act... and more. What is the common and frequent case that you find during your operations? And what are the most common food frauds? Over the years I’ve had several cases of street vendors selling defrosted fish passing it off as fresh. In order to recognise this fraud in the market, there is a technique which was present in veterinary books about 35 to 40 years ago and which has now disappeared: the crystalline lens technique. It is a technique with a 100% success rate. In practice, the fishmonger is asked to dissect one eye of the suspicious fish and extract the crystalline lens. You look at it against the light. If it is completely transparent the fish