The Department of Food Sciences and Nutrition and the Centre for Biomedical Cybernetics are representing the University of Malta through its participation in MEDIFIT, a Europe-wide project enabling more traceability and authenticity control of traditional Mediterranean foods using the latest analytical and software technologies.
Having kicked off on 1 June, MEDIFIT will develop and implement analytical platforms enabling detection and quantitation of adulterations. Adulteration is the action of making something poorer in quality by the addition of another substance.
These analytical platforms will then be used to train researchers, stakeholders, and end-users during the full course of the programme.
This project focuses on two traditional Mediterranean commodities, namely cheese and honey. Cheese and honey are among the top 6 products that are more at risk of food fraud, while they are also the most frequently reported foods in the EU’s monthly Food Fraud Summary.
MEDIFIT is a consortium partnership of 12 entities, consisting of 7 enterprises, 3 academic organisations, and 2 authorities from Greece, Malta, Spain, Germany, Tunisia and Turkey. It falls under the PRIMA initiative (Partnership for Research and Innovation in the Mediterranean Area).
Prof. Valdramidis is the principal investigator and he is assisted by Dr Owen Falzon, his co-principal investigator, as well as Dr Sholeem Griffin, a Research Support Officer.