The problem here is the disconnect between science and law.
Risk management and knowingly exposing PFAS communities to elevated levels of PFAS
is totally different to deliberately focus on the general population.
Both have different roles.
One is to establish causation via evidence.
The other is to manage risk to people via a duty of care and statutory obligations.

PFAS - food safety CON

"You are producers, we'll just set the levels [PFAS] and you will be right for ever and a day. It will always be safe", stated a well-known toxicologist at a very public Queensland meeting to impacted farmers fearful about their livelihood and ability to sell their livestock at market. It is very concerning that PFAS levels have remained irresponsibly higher than other countries. But to state the levels can be manipulated to suit a desired outcome reveals our food safety laws are open to abuse. Further reading puts the integrity of Food Standards Australia New Zealand (FSANZ) in question and whether political influence is infiltrating our food standards codes? 
  • UPDATE October 2024 - Australia is finally updating drinking water guidelines and PFAS fact sheets. Opportunity to provide feedback here. Unfortunately what's proposed is underwhelming.

australia's position on pfas

February 2024, enHealth releases it most updated health PFAS guidance factsheet - enHealth continues to work with the Australian Government Department of Health and Aged Care and NHMRC to consider the latest evidence and ensure advice is consistent, feasible and appropriate for the Australian context.
What a shocker, it is using the same FSANZ diet study, a non-credible ANU health study and outdated drinking water guidelines.
It just continues the same coverup from 2019 with PFAS lifetime exposure levels unchanged since 2017.
​I challenged the FSANZ Board on 20 February 2023 giving them an opportunity to reset their inexcusable position stance on PFAS. Their quick response, 2 March 2023, is the evidence of their updated position - dangerous and irresponsible when we know that state and federal governments are not collating any evidence that would warrant updating.
Read the following complaint letter sent to the FSANZ Board challenging lack of protections for human health highlighting the potential for Board Directors to be liable on what is foreseeable and a lack of due diligence.
Their response on 9 March 2023 continues the business as usual while international standards keep lowering.
The FSANZ response noted their own 2021 review of the Immunomodulation potential of PFAS peer reviewed by an unknown external expert in epidemiology to back up their inaction.
A new and far more credible review, 'Consideration of pathways for immunotoxicity of per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS)' was available on 22 February 2023 being the most updated health information for immune effects which highlights FSANZ's attempt to undermine the small number of health studies as petty.

​ABC Radio Northern Territory broadcast an episode with Professor Mark Taylor in 2017 about How worried do we need to be about PFAS chemicals? Professor Mark Taylor is now EPA Victoria's Chief Environmental Scientist. Listen to him clarify "absence of evidence doesn't mean evidence of absence". 

why is fsanz on the nose

FSANZ develops food standards and sets Tolerable Daily Intake (TDIs) for PFAS to ensure no deceptive conduct and that food purchased is safe to consume. The only deceptive conduct is from FSANZ  for the general population.
TDIs can be established by comparing the estimated dietary exposure to a food chemical with a known health-based guidance value, for example, an acceptable daily intake (ADI) for a substance is the amount of that substance that can be consumed daily without adverse health effects.
For PFAS, toxicologists set the TDIs from toxicology studies on the express objective to limit the amount of PFAS exposures from what you eat and drink.
The problem is FSANZ buy some samples from the different supermarket chains around Australia to do their studies. They do not go direct to highly contaminated areas that also produce food for human consumption irresponsibility condoned by government.
CoM challenges:
  • the 'dietary modelling' techniques used for PFAS are not credible
  • known health-based guidance value are not based on updated peer reviewed international science rather using Australian 'experts' to discredit studies
  • ability of FSANZ to reduce the level of risk to the ENTIRE population from increasing PFAS exposure​
​Read their latest 2021 report - 27th Australian Total Diet Study PFAS substances and the accompanying technical documents.
  • ​This study is useless for heavily exposed individuals wanting to know targeted information about the food and water sourced in their local regional area. There are no studies so huge data gaps.
  • It's just a bunch of statistics using means and average analysis on everything general.
  • FSANZ know this is not protecting those people most impacted.
Australia only list 3 PFAS substances of concern, PFOA, PFOS and PFHxS and at high levels.  Units of measure are confusing as are the symbols so a quick look on the PFAS measurements page will make it clearer but it's Australia's comparison to the European Union and US that is the evidence of Australia's irresponsible inaction. 
​Our Australian TDIs are used as 'safe end points' for risk assessments which are indefensible but how safe are they when our contemporaries have declared they are not based on up-to-date science.
​The trickle-down effect then allows other agencies to use FSANZ TDIs as a default position so PFAS contaminated livestock and food produce using PFAS contaminated water or feed stock can be sold or determined is safe to consume which would be way above international levels.
All the while the individual is being deceived and misled about what they are consuming.
​Agriculture Victoria continues the best example of PFAS misinformation dished out by a government entity.
​​This has implications for Australia export trade for red meat, eggs and derived products.  ​
As of November 2024, Australia is still not proposing any changes, any new rules for labelling, new updates for wastewater treatment or how to reduce PFAS at the source origin.

How does Australia compare to EU & USA?

Just to confuse with another unit of measure, a Department of Health representative in NSW gave a figure to a farmer that 19 nanograms per millilitre of blood (19ng/mL =19ppb =19000ppt) is what they model for livestock  which equated to the farmer being told not to eat any more than 200grams of his own beef per month because his cattle's PFAS blood levels were around 180ng/mL (180,000ppt) to 390ng/mL (390,000ppt) just for PFOS so the sum total was over 500,000ppt.
Read the story here, Exclusive: Beef stock raised near RAAF base contaminated from toxic foam
*Note -there are cattle raised for human consumption all around Australia in areas contaminated by Defence, ESSO, CFA, Waste Water Treatment Plants and numerous industries that government are doing nothing about yet the PFAS plumes are expanding, some rapidly. Worst is government undermining the extent of PFAS hotspots.
The farmer was told you can ON-SELL for some other person to consume.
That one piece of beef over the month does not account for all the other exposures of PFAS from drinking water, other food products, PFAS residues from unlabelled household and personal consumer products through to ingesting the dust the farmer works in. 
These figures are way too high but important to note this is the only time a measurable figure has been noted.
As a comparison -
The EU have amended their Maximum Residue Limits (MRL) of PFAS in certain foodstuffs.
The food commodities lists with MRL can be found here which have been set to ensure a high level of human health protection from imports.
Australia need to ensure red meat exports are below these levels but continue not to declare MRLs.
As an example,
  • Meat of bovine animals, pigs and poultry alone, the EU's MRL for the sum of PFOS, PFOA, PFNA and PFHxS is 1.3μg/kg (1.3ppb =1300ppt), sheep is 1600ppt.
  • Maine in USA, which is known for its dairy farms has set MRL for beef of 3.4 ng/g (3.4ppb =3400ppt)
We know of cattle in Australia with PFAS blood serum levels around 1500ng/ml (1,500,000ppt) which the Australian Government has declared is fit for human consumption.
  • Our food safety laws are compromised along with the people facilitating the coverup.
You can’t see or taste PFAS, but there are 1,000s of chemicals that could be lurking in your drinking water, food, consumer products and environment causing everything from birth defects to cancer because PFAS build up in our blood and organs. This has the potential to damage the health of millions for decades to come and the Australia Government are pretending it is not a problem!!!

​The background story

The Saturday Paper exposed this conflict of interest where 'consultants paid millions by Defence helped revise chemical safety standards that could shield the department from multiple compensation claims. The April 5 workshop set “tolerable daily intake” levels for both chemicals at 75 times higher than acceptable limits in the United States. Safe drinking water limits were set at more than 78 times the US level. At the workshop were Golder Associates, a global environmental consultancy; Newcastle-based CRC Care, part owned by the Defence Department; and the Melbourne company ToxConsult.'
ToxConsult were also engaged by ESSO with the Gippsland PFAS scandal at their Longford Gas plant where ESSO breached their EPA discharge licence and now appears to have PFAS contamination of groundwater, surface water and soil all the way to the coast.
The article from 2016 was damning and rightly so stating 'The relaxed guidelines could help defence reduce potential legal liability for contamination and clean-up costs, lawyers say. This is a serious issue for the Defence Department.' 

​Tracking PFAS contaminated food

Our health is the sum of food and water we consume but without disclosures or origins we don't know what we are feeding our families. For the general population, the main route of exposure to PFAS is through food and the consumption of contaminated drinking water. But for the population in PFAS hotspots, exposure increases.
CoM provided a submission ​into the 2018 Inquiry into the management of per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) contamination in and around Defence bases. Shocking that a federal inquiry on PFAS was limited to defence sites for two reasons:
  1. media-based stories centred around Defence sites only rather than other industry PFAS contamination sources
  2. complicates how the rest of Australia with state based regulatory frameworks could respond and coordinate management between agencies of the Commonwealth Government. 
This inquiry goes to the heart of major livestock authorities burying their heads in the contaminated dirt, namely Dept of Foreign Affairs & Trade, SafeMeat, Meat & Livestock Australia, Dairy Australia, insurance liability and Occupational Health & Safety. 
CoM did get a quote noted in the final report with subsections noted on this webpage link.
  • 6.8 The Coalition Against PFAS described this situation as ‘contradictory and illogical’, and noted that some farmers had elected to stop selling altogether in order to prevent contaminated produce from entering the nation’s food supply. The group also highlighted biosecurity risks faced by livestock producers in some areas, and attached correspondence from three separate cattle breeders associations who had written to the Government to warn of ‘potentially catastrophic’ consequences to producers’ livelihoods, Australia’s export markets and the beef industry as a whole. The Coalition Against PFAS called for the Government to ‘take a clear and reasonable position on biosecurity’.
  • 6.9 Ms Dianne Priddle, a stud cattle producer in Oakey, told the Committee that consumers had a right to know whether products were contaminated by PFAS: We all trade on our image which is clean and green within Australia and the world. … The consumers have the right to know—and they want to know—what they are eating in Australia and how we produced that item. Yet at assessments and walk-in sessions given by Defence and AECOM, the question has been asked and the answer given that the public does not have the right to know if PFAS contamination is in the product. This is a double standard.
  • 6.10  Tracey Anton [CoM], of the Latrobe Valley in Victoria, similarly raised concerns that either the Government was allowing PFAS contaminated agricultural produce to be exported, or it was being distributed in the domestic market while ‘denying a person a right to choose between contaminated and non-contaminated foodstuff’.
  • 6.11 The Victorian Government submitted that a ‘lack of nationally regulated maximum levels for PFAS in foods complicates the provision of defensible advice to agriculture producers, including livestock producers and meat processors’. However, it noted that the health-based guidance values developed by Food Standards Australia New Zealand had provided some clarity and consistency across jurisdictions.
Absolutely nothing has changed to improve this selective management other than state consistency with the Commonwealth. CoM is concerned for the potential of forced complicity - comply or else, as the states could legally adopt more stringent guidelines and regulatory framework.   
What we are left with are Australian toxicologists and state agricultural Chief Veterinarians providing outcomes why contaminated livestock can be sold at market for human consumption in conflict with Food Acts.
​This issue is also dealt with on the PFAS Livestock page.

​what is acceptable

Chemicals are the hazards to human health but the risk is the probability of harm. You can't have zero risk as every chemical presents a risk starting at negligible risk.
As an example,
  • sugar presents a negligible risk to human health.
Polluters like ESSO and Government pay consultants  and research universities to conduct health studies in major contaminated areas concluding:
  • PFOS/PFOA contamination presents a low risk to humans.
Whereas, science from other countries has already declared: 
  • PFOS/PFOA presents an unacceptable risk to human health.
Hazard vs Risk
The more exposure the greater the risk therefore companies like ESSO and government, including state EPAs are being deliberately deceptive!!!
In sum, studies have shown that exposure to PFOA and PFOS is associated with numerous and varied adverse effects to human health. This evidence plays a major role in the EPA's [US] proposal to designate PFOA and PFOS as hazardous substances. Proposed Designation of Perfluorooctanoic Acid (PFOA) and Perfluorooctanesulfonic Acid (PFOS) as CERCLA Hazardous Substances

Why Victoria is noteworthy

​​Victoria had the Fiskville Inquiry in 2015 where a lot was exposed to uncover what should be happening with our food safety but isn't.
What happened in this inquiry is entirely relevant to other sites around Victoria and Australia.
There is an established hierarchy of responsibility overseeing heavily PFAS contaminated sites from state based EPA appointed auditors, consultant companies conducting human health assessments, toxicologists, etc., to determine the risks to the person, environment and a business.  A toxicologist can't look at evidence without understanding the latest research so when overseas countries says it's a problem and their TDIs are so much lower, how can Victoria, Queensland, NSW and others say it is not a problem here and rate risk as low potentially allowing polluters to be absolved from liability and compensation?
State of knowledge if applied responsibly is powerful. Pleading ignorance in court just won't cut it.  

who is pulling the strings of our food safety code

​​If you are buying a product that the relevant state and territory Food Act is saying is safe to eat - then it should be backed up by the Federal Food Safety Code. To note, these codes and Acts are the law of the land and are in place for a reason and what the Australian Government should be complying with but is not.​
Victorian FOOD ACT 1994 - SECT 4E - Meaning of unsuitable food:
 (1)     For the purposes of this Act, food is unsuitable if it is food that--
   (d)     contains a biological or chemical agent, or other matter or substance, that is foreign to the nature of the food.
 (2)     However, food is not unsuitable for the purposes of this Act merely because--
   (d)     it contains any matter or substance that is permitted by the Food Standards Code.
​I am not aware of any part of the Food Safety Code that states one, or any number of PFAS compounds, are permitted by the Food Safety Code in any food group therefore the levels of any PFAS compound for consumption should be ZERO.
This is backed up with transcripts from the 2015 Fiskville Inquiry when Dr Brendan Tatham from PrimeSafe was asked the following questions.
​PFAS standards are controlled by FSANZ, informed by toxicologists that appear to have a vested interest in Commonwealth PFAS contaminated sites using outdated science to inform risk assessments.
This is one hell of a rort and convenient that Department of Health are silent on PFAS exposures using the same default back to FSANZ.
This PrimeSafe transcript from the Fiskville Inquiry needs to be read in total (8 pages- 70KB) to highlight mismanagement at the highest level.
The CHAIR—Are you aware if there are any standards in respect of perfluorinated chemicals such as PFOS or PFOA?
  • Dr TATHAM—The standards which PrimeSafe utilises and makes codes under the Meat Industry Act, the two which are relevant here are 4696, an Australian standard for the hygienic production of meat for human consumption, and then the food standards code. Under the food standards code there is a list of maximum residue limits for a range of chemicals. They are listed within the food standards code. The technical detail is described in my statement. PFOS is not one of the chemicals listed in the food standards code, which means that in order for compliance to be demonstrated by an abattoir for the food standards code, there should be zero or at the not detectable limit for that chemical, if it is not listed as an MRL in the food standards code.
The CHAIR—So if it is not listed in the standard, then it should not be present?
  • Dr TATHAM--Correct.
The CHAIR—Just on that, the food standards code says that these are the things that can be in livestock and at these levels, if they are going to be consumed by humans, and PFOS is not one of them and therefore it should not be in the livestock. In this case, PrimeSafe is aware that there is PFOS in these animals but it takes no action even though it should not be there. It seems a bit of a contradiction in responsibilities or legislation.
  • Dr TATHAM—I understand the issue that you have identified. When non-compliance is suspected or detected with regard to issues of public health, PrimeSafe seeks advice from the chief health officer around: is there a public health risk, and therefore should PrimeSafe put in place any regulatory action which is over and above what the standards require? So in a way the standards are just looking after what happens on a day-to-day basis and if an issue—--
The CHAIR—So do you know why this chemical is not on the food standards schedule or the code?
  • Dr TATHAM—No, I do not know the answer to that question. I would have thought that given that there is now data being produced around the chemical and that is an increasing amount of data over time, that it might be something that the food standards code and the national agency that sets those limits would be wanting to consider.
Mr RICHARDSON—Following on from that, why then is it not listed on the standards?
  • Dr TATHAM—Again, I cannot answer that question. The standards are controlled by FSANZ, Food Standards Australia New Zealand. It is a commonwealth body, and is informed by science and risk assessment people at the national level.
​The relevant state and federal ministers are asking people and businesses to break state and federal laws.
  • What right has FSANZ got to overrule state & federal laws and ignore the objectives of their own acts? 
  • What right has FSANZ got to overrule people's safety, their families, pregnant women and children?
​Ultimately, the FSANZ Board decides whether or not to approve changes to the Food Standards Code. These decisions are notified to Australian and New Zealand ministers responsible for food regulation (the Australia and New Zealand Ministerial Forum on Food Regulation). The forum can adopt, make changes to or reject standards and can ask FSANZ to review its decisions.
​All the relevant Ministers are part of this forum and making decisions to not regulate PFAS with FSANZ complicit.
​​About time the FSANZ Board and responsible ministers are held to account.
Forum membership is designed to reflect the whole-of-food chain approach to food regulation. Members include the following:
  • Minister from New Zealand
  • Ministers from the Australian Government
  • Health Ministers from the Australian States and Territories
  • Ministers from related portfolios (Primary Industries, Consumer Affairs) where they have been nominated by their jurisdictions
  • The Australian Local Government Association (ALGA), who participates as an observer.​
  > all paths lead back to FSANZ