Food Additives Intake Model (FAIM) - Version 1.1 - July 2013

The Food Additives Intake Model (FAIM) was developed as a tool for estimating chronic exposure to food additives. It was developed by EFSA to support applicants in the estimation of exposure to a food additive and to harmonise the submission of the related data. FAIM is based on food consumption data from the EFSA Comprehensive European Food Consumption Database. The exposure estimates calculated with the use of the FAIM tool are based on summary statistics of individual raw food consumption data available in the EFSA Comprehensive European Food Consumption Database (EFSA Comprehensive Database), which was built from most recent national dietary surveys provided by competent organisations in the European Union‟s Member States. The FAIM tool includes food consumption data for children, adolescents, adults and the elderly for a total of 26 different dietary surveys carried out in 17 different Member States.  The nomenclature used in the FAIM tool is the one used within the Food Classification System (FCS) presented in Part D of Annex II to the Regulation (EC) No 1333/2008 of the European Parliament and of the Council on food additives. The FCS consists of four levels; however, for the sake of simplicity, data at level 2 of the FCS are in general provided within the FAIM. The food nomenclature used in the FAIM consists of 65 food groups The quality of the food consumption data included in the EFSA Comprehensive Database mainly depends on the methods used to collect individual food consumption data at national level. In the Guidance on the use of the EFSA Comprehensive European Food Consumption Database in Exposure Assessment (EFSA, 2011a) and in the scientific publication by Merten et al. (2011), the methodologies used within the available dietary surveys and their impact on exposure assessment are described in detail.

For the purposes of FAIM, MPLs of use as set in Annex II to Regulation (EC) No 1333/2008, and maximum reported use levels as provided by industry are the use levels mainly considered by EFSA in the application of the FAIM in exposure assessments. Concentration data from other sources i.e. analytical/monitoring data could also be considered, where suitable and available. The exposure estimates calculated with FAIM provide information on the mean and high level exposures per age class (toddlers, children, adolescents, adults and the elderly), summarised per dietary survey and food category. The approach used for estimating high percentiles of exposure from all contributing food sources is based on the assumption that an individual might be a high-level consumer of one food category only, and would be an average consumer of all the remaining food groups. This method consists of adding the highest high level of exposure from one food category (calculated for consumers only) to the mean exposure values for the remaining categories (calculated for the total population). Furthermore, the model provides information on the food groups contributing to the total mean exposure (% of contribution per food group and per dietary survey), with focus on the main contributing food groups (> 5 % of total exposure) across the EU countries (range of min-max of % contribution across dietary surveys).