The European Union launches new AI tool to strengthen food safety controls

The European Commission has launched TraceMap, an artificial intelligence platform that enables national authorities to detect food fraud, trace contamination and accelerate product recalls.

TraceMap, a new artificial intelligence (AI) platform from the European Commission, aims to accelerate the detection of food fraud, contaminated food and foodborne disease outbreaks in the European Union.

The platform is already accessible to national authorities in all EU Member States, with the aim of improving food safety controls and investigations. “TraceMap is a breakthrough that will revolutionise the EU’s capacity to respond to food safety crises and to combat food fraud,” stated Olivér Várhelyi, European Commissioner for Health and Animal Welfare.

He highlighted that the platform will provide better coordination between countries and stronger protection for both farmers and consumers.

“This is critical infrastructure for crisis prevention and control and should help reinforce the confidence of all stakeholders in our robust food safety systems,” Várhelyi added. According to the Commission, TraceMap will use the extensive data already existing in agri-food systems to track trade patterns and production flows in near real time.

With this in mind, the tool will employ AI to improve safety risk assessments, rapidly identify links between operators and distribution, and monitor the supply chain to enable swift recalls of unsafe products.

TraceMap has already been put to the test.

A pilot version was used in the recent Europe-wide infant formula recalls linked to contaminated ingredients originating from China. Approximately one third of notifications were border rejections, mainly due to pesticide residues in fruit and vegetable imports from Turkey, Egypt and India, according to the European Commission. The countries that submitted the most notifications were Germany (1,907), the Netherlands (1,155) and Italy (965).

In 2024, European countries reported 6,558 foodborne outbreaks, an increase of 14.5% compared to the previous year, according to the latest data from the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA).

The most frequently reported foodborne diseases in Europe are campylobacteriosis, salmonellosis, STEC infection (caused by E. coli) and listeriosis.

In 2024, Listeria caused the highest proportion of hospitalisations and deaths among all foodborne infections reported in the EU. Approximately 7 in every 10 people infected with Listeria required hospital care, and 1 in every 12 died.

Further information:
-. TraceMap traceability tool (EU)