the european food safety authority&rsquos efsa finding in january that bisphenol a bpa poses no health risk to consumers at current exposure levels may be brought to bear on france, which has unilaterally banned bpa in food packaging.&ldquoclearly, the plastics industry strongly objects to such differing standards and laws in individual member states in what is designed to be a single european market,&rdquo said jasmin bird at plasticseurope&rsquos pcbpa group. &ldquosuch disproportionate bans weaken, rather than strengthen consumer safety, as they sacrifice proven solutions that were developed and optimised over decades to protect food and thus safeguard consumers. the fact that any realistic exposure to bpa is well below even the conservative safety threshold established by efsa shows that blanket restrictions being applied at national level, in particular in france, are unjustified and should be withdrawn.&rdquothe plastics industry organisation filed a complaint with the european commission in march 2013 against the french law, which took effect on 1 january 2015. in the complaint, plasticseurope claims france has infringed eu regulations on food contact materials. in response to the complaint, the commission has started a dialogue with the french government under an eu pilot procedure, said vytenis andriukaitis, commissioner for health and food safety, in december 2014.it has requested information about the justification and proportionality of the ban. &ldquothe commission is in close contact with the french authorities, in parallel with the ongoing procedure, with a view to finding a satisfactory solution,&rdquo said andriukaitis. the commission will take into account efsa&rsquos opinion announced in january, he said. after preliminary consultations in eu pilot, the commission may start infringement proceedings.in the view of plasticseurope, the commission must take action against france for its unilateral ban. bird said &ldquothe efsa conclusion on bpa should be used as the basis for consistent and harmonised european food safety regulation for bpa, which should be respected by all eu member states. we therefore expect the commission to act according to its own rules and principles. &ldquoindustry certainly reconfirms its position regarding this issue and finds it logical and appropriate that an infringement process be launched, given that the efsa opinion clearly shows that the french restriction on bpa is disproportionate.&rdquo efsa declared bpa safe at current exposure levels, but decided after using new risk methodologies to reduce the safe level of bpa from 50 micrograms per kilogram of body weight per day to 4 µgkg of bwday.some ngos have continued to raise concerns following the efsa announcement. gwynne lyons, policy director at chem trust, said &ldquowe are at least glad to see that the tolerable daily intake tdi has been reduced by an order of magnitude since 2006, and chem trust considers it is likely that this will again need to be reduced in future.&rdquo plasticseurope stressed that efsa&rsquos reduction of the tdi was a conservative move. the reduction was not connected to any new health concerns about bpa that have emerged, but instead was because the method used to assess the risk from bpa has become more refined.bird said &ldquothe setting of a sciencebased tdi is the normal way that risk management measures can be derived and consumer safety assured. therefore, demands for an ever lower tdi for bpa based on the precautionary principle are not justifiable. efsa accounted for potential uncertainties using a very conservative approach. no additional uncertainty factor is therefore warranted and consumers can continue to safely use the respective products.&rdquo lisette van vliet, senior policy advisor at the health & environment alliance heal, was reported by the euractiv website as criticising efsa for its approach to remaining uncertainties. &ldquoit seems to be the equivalent of saying &lsquomy lost car keys are definitely not on the ground of the parking lot&rsquo, without making it clear that you&rsquove only looked under the parking lot lamppost," she said.plasticseurope said it was satisfied with efsa&rsquos method, which used backward and forward modelling. bird said &ldquosince backward modelled exposure estimates based on urinary bpa concentrations are in agreement with forward modelled estimates of internal exposure to total bpa, efsa´s cef panel indicated that it is likely that no major exposure sources have been missed for the modelled exposure assessment. efsa highlights that the uncertainties in the nonoral exposure assessment resulted in conservative assumptions, and, consequently, probably an overestimation of exposure.&rdquoeuropean commissioner vytenis andriukaitis is taking efsa&rsquos bpa verdict into account during discussions with french authorities. 
