A pesticide banned in the EU for decades turned up in hundreds of botanical supplements, spices, and food additives, triggering one of the largest food-safety alert waves in recent EU history — and it started with sesame seeds.
How the contamination was discovered
Ethylene oxide is a chemical banned for use as a pesticide in the EU, though still permitted in countries including the US, Canada, and India, where it's used to sterilize products against microbial contamination like Salmonella. In September 2020, Belgium notified the EU's Rapid Alert System for Food and Feed (RASFF) of ethylene oxide contamination in sesame seeds from India. Within months, nearly every EU member state had reported related findings, eventually totaling over 700 RASFF notifications.
How it spread well beyond sesame seeds
What started as a sesame seed issue expanded significantly through 2021, as monitoring authorities found ethylene oxide contamination in a much wider range of raw materials, including locust bean gum, guar gum, xanthan gum, and multiple spices. Critically for this block: specific documented RASFF notifications confirmed contamination in food supplements based on ginger extract, ashwagandha extract, and moringa powder — meaning this wasn't just a spice-aisle issue, it reached directly into the supplement market.
Why enforcement got contentious
The EU Commission took the position that any detectable ethylene oxide above the limit of quantification made a product non-compliant, regardless of whether it was found in the final finished product or only in a raw ingredient earlier in the supply chain. Some member states pushed back on the practicality and consistency of this zero-tolerance approach, and the Commission subsequently tightened official import controls specifically for high-risk country/product combinations from India and elsewhere.
How to check the RASFF portal yourself
- Go to the RASFF portal's public search window.
- Search by product category (food supplements) or by specific ingredient (ashwagandha, ginger, moringa, and similar botanicals are worth checking given the documented history).
- Check notification dates against when you purchased the product — recalls typically cover specific batches, not necessarily every batch of a brand indefinitely.
- If your product or its batch appears in an active notification, stop using it and contact the retailer or manufacturer for a refund.
What this means practically
- Ethylene oxide contamination reached specific, named supplement categories — ginger, ashwagandha, and moringa products among them — not just spices sold loose.
- The RASFF portal is a genuinely useful public tool for checking whether a specific product category has an active contamination alert.
- A batch-specific recall doesn't necessarily mean every unit of that brand or product line is affected — check the specific notification details.
- If you've used a supplement from an affected category, checking RASFF is worth doing even without symptoms, given the pesticide's carcinogenic classification.
Sources
- Phytolab — Specific RASFF notifications for ethylene oxide in ginger, ashwagandha, and moringa supplements: phytolab.com
- Food Safety News — Ongoing EU ethylene oxide recalls and RASFF notification volume: foodsafetynews.com
Related Kibbo Tools
- Supplement Recall Directory — direct links to RASFF and other national recall portals.
- Product Recall & Contamination Incident Log — document your response if you find your product listed.