To combat the rising issue of counterfeit alcoholic spirits, researchers have designed a way to generate ‘chemical fingerprints.’
The rise in unauthentic alcohol is a detrimental issue within the industry, with the World Health Organisation estimating that a quarter of all spirits are fake. This, in turn, lowers legitimate sales and erodes consumer trust.
Illicit alcoholic products have led to significant economic losses, as well as over 23,400 job losses annually.
Counterfeit products have caused a EUR 3 billion revenue drop and at least EUR 1.2 billion in government revenue losses.
The motive behind creating counterfeit spirits is that the profit margin is higher when selling cheaper alternatives for similar or discounted prices as regular alcohol.
This has pushed for a new wave of innovations to arise to combat this issue and analyse illicit alcohol.
The research team at Heriot Wyatt University, Scotland, has used analytical tools like infrared spectroscopy (NMR) to determine the chemistry of sample spirits. This can provide a rapid and low-cost screening method for manufacturers.
Once this has been completed, the database will provide an in-depth analysis of hundreds of legitimate spirits and become an information source for determining a product's authenticity.
The consumer risk when drinking counterfeit products is significant, with substitutes consisting of poisonous compounds, including nail polish remover, methanol and paint stripper, chemicals used in cleaning fluids, car window wash, antifreeze, ethyl acetate, and acetaldehyde.
All major distillers explicitly list counterfeit spirits as the most fundamental threats to consumer well-being.
Although existing methods of detecting illicit alcohol do work, they often require expensive equipment and consumable reagents.
Gathering a database through these innovations will outline a spirit of legitimacy and result in lower costs and more rapid testing. Any step towards helping brand integrity and authenticity has a sizeable commercial value and is essential in preventing illegal counterfeits from saturating the market.
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