Senior Expert Office for the Import Control of Wine

The BfRshort forGerman Federal Institute for Risk Assessment is the senior expert office for the import control of wine.

Senior expert reports are prepared when samples of imported wines from non-EU countries taken by customs officials are queried by the initial expert office and the second expert office comes to a deviating conclusion. The first and second expert offices are official wine monitoring offices of the federal states.

The definitive assessment of the sample by the senior expert office is binding in every case for the customs authority. Given its decisive role, the senior expert office must meet the highest expectations in respect of analysis and assessment. Its tasks, therefore, include raising the level of scientific knowledge in order to improve and harmonise the control options and developing new methods for the purpose of uncovering increasingly sophisticated adulterations. The main focus of its work is on questions relating to the origin, the type of grape or the detection of unauthorised oenological methods for wine.

The quality characteristics of a wine - like wine growing area, grape variety, vintage - must be indicated on the label. However, this information is not always accurate. Analytical methods are therefore needed to confirm all declarations of label descriptions or to detect fraudulent statements or illegal additives like glycerol. The official wine control requires methods that improve the analysis of wine and permit the identification of its origin.

The task of the BfRshort forGerman Federal Institute for Risk Assessment Senior Expert Office for Wine is to develop methods to determine origin, grape variety, illegal additives and unauthorised oenological practices. The BfRshort forGerman Federal Institute for Risk Assessment Senior Expert Office for Wine is also responsible for authenticating other foods.

• Development and validation of methods
  • Detection of glycerine admixture to wine
  • Determination of thujone in absinth
  • Quantification of wine ingredients using nuclear magnetic response (NMR)
• Further development of databases for the authentication of wine (analytical methods, parameters and assessment)
• Development of methods for the authentication of wine and foods
  • Conduct of the EU research project on the creation of a database for third country wines similar to the EU wine database (determination of origin of wines using multivariate statistics)
  • Use of stable isotope ratio analysis for authentication (isotope ratio mass spectrometry: ¹⁸Oshort foroxygen/¹⁶Oshort foroxygen, ¹³C/¹²C analysis of higher alcohols)
  • Determination of origin of pistachio nuts (stable isotope ratio analysis, NMR)