Trust Me, I'm An Expert

What have you eaten today? And how much do you know about how it was produced, what was added to it along the way, and how it made its way to your plate?

Even as most of us grow increasingly removed from actual food production, many consumers still take food fraud and perceptions of food purity incredibly seriously.

Scandals around “meat glue” or milk and honey contamination, and the skyrocketing global interest in organic foods, underscore the fact that many of us still care quite deeply about the foods we eat and how they’re produced – and that’s affecting food labelling, regulation and consumer behaviour.

One person who’s studied that terrain closely is Dr Andrew Ventimiglia, a Research Fellow at The University of Queensland, who researches food fraud and how it relates to science, culture, trademark law and food regulation.

He sat down with The Conversation’s deputy politics and society editor Justin Bergman to talk about the weird history of food adulteration and certification – everything from 19th century dairy farmers adding sheep brains to skim milk to make it look frothier, to centuries-old oil and wine adulteration scandals.

Dr Ventimiglia said types of food fraud laws have been recorded as early as the 13th century, but the issue really came into focus in the 1800s.

Adulterated milk was one of the first issues that got national attention, and this was roughly in the mid 1800s to late 1800s, both particularly in the UK and the US. And the earliest form of adulterated milk that was really concerning to regulators was actually simply skim milk.

Producers who were making skim milk were adding flour or starch, sometimes carrots for sweetness, but they were also adding things that did pose a public health risk.

So, for instance, chalk was added to increase the whiteness of milk, as well as often sheep or calf brains to froth the milk […] those posed really legitimate health risks that were recognised by early analytic chemists and that really initiated some early food regulations.

And while food scandals persist today, food standards are increasingly more concerned with fraudulent claims on packaging and innovations in food production. For instance, is yoghurt made with coconut milk still considered yoghurt? What to do about foods that claim to be “all natural?”

Special thanks to our multimedia intern, Dilpreet Kaur Taggar, for editing this segment together.

We also hear from Associate Professor Shauna Murray from the UTS Plant Functional Biology and Climate Change Cluster, about her research into ciguatera fish poisoning. It’s a non-bacterial illness associated with fish consumption and symptoms in humans may include gastrointestinal, neurological and even sometimes cardiovascular problems.

Editorial intern Jordan Fermanis spoke to Dr Murray about why this tropical disease is showing up further south, and how recreational fishermen are helping researchers unlock the mysteries of ciguatera.

Trust Me, I’m An Expert is a podcast where we ask academics to surprise, delight and inform us with their research. You can download previous episodes here.

And please, do check out other podcasts from The Conversation – including The Conversation US’ Heat and Light, about 1968 in the US, and The Anthill from The Conversation UK, as well as Media Files, a brand new podcast all about the media. You can find all our podcasts over here.

Additional editing by Dilpreet Kaur Taggar

Kindergarten by Unkle Ho, from Elefant Traks

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Demand increases for organic produce, 23 ABC News.

Is your honey real honey or just “sugar syrup”? ABC News Australia.

Fake honey: Study finds disturbing results, ABC News Australia.

Meat glue secret, Today Tonight.

Chinese milk report, CNN.

Missouri Wine History, MissouriWine.

Pure. Fresh. Milk. 1991 Promo.

Australian milk ad.

Sad Marimba Planet by Lee Rosevere from Free Music Archive

Australia has just had its driest September on record, and the second driest month ever: the only drier month was April 1902.

The Bureau of Meteorology’s tropical cyclone outlook is out today. It’s predicting a weaker-than-normal tropical cyclone season this year but if one hits – and it’s likely one will – it’ll bring water to rain-starved soil that will soak it up and reduce the flooding risk.

Wes Mountain speaks to forecaster Andrew Watkins, who explains how the forecast works, why a cyclone could help some farms, and how to keep safe this cyclone season.

We’ve never gone through a tropical cyclone season without at least one hitting our coast, but Australia’s past may no longer be a reliable guide to our future.

In her book Sunburnt Country: the history and future of climate change in Australia, scientist Joelle Gergis maps Australia’s climate over thousands of years. While we’ve always been a land of extremes, rapid warming since 1950 is starting to alter our weather patterns.

Dr Gergis told Madeleine De Gabriele about creating the most comprehensive history of Australia’s climate ever, and why she still has hope for the future.

Credits

Free Music Archive: Podington Bear, Clouds, Rain, Sun

ABC: Morrison talks drought relief on first day as PM

Free Music Archive: Blue Dot Sessions - El Tajo

Free Music Archive: Blue Dot Sessions - Arizona Moon

It’s easy to write off Australia’s extreme weather as business as usual. We deal with floods, droughts, cyclones and other wild events every year. But as climate change raises global temperatures, are the droughts happening more often? Are the floods getting worse?

The October episode of Trust Me, I’m An Expert looks back through colonial evidence and prehistoric records, and forward to the Bureau of Meteorology’s Cyclone Weather Outlook for the year ahead.

The full episode will be released on October 8, but today you can catch a little of our interview with the Bureau of Meteorology’s Andrew Watkins. Keep an eye out for the full episode, where we ask: are we in uncharted territory, or is this life as usual on a changeable continent?

Trust Me I’m An Expert is a monthly podcast from The Conversation, where we bring you stories, ideas and insights from the world of academic research.

You can download previous episodes of Trust Me here. And please do check out other podcasts from The Conversation – including The Conversation US’ Heat and Light, about 1968 in the US, and The Anthill from The Conversation UK, as well as Media Files, a brand new podcast all about the media.

You can find all our podcasts over here.

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