Gluten Free Standards • Laboratories International

General information

The Certification Process
GFS Laboratories International, Certification is an easy process, but not a simple one. GFS Labs have taken a very complicated testing regime and streamlined the process to help certify and audit quickly and efficiently. GFS Labs goal is to verify everyone, although not everyone can be certified. This is because high variance issues can prevent the facility or food product from meeting the requirements for certification.

The World Health Organization are clinical researchers for the current European Standard; in 2010 restated their definition of gluten-free to mean the amount of trace gluten that could be found in a food item must be reduced from 200 ppm (parts per million) to 20 ppm in the total weight of the product. In conjunction with the World Health Organizations (WHO) definition of gluten-free, Gluten Free Standards maintains this 20ppm standard as our minimum allowance for gluten free certification. However, our standards are far more strict, for your products to be defined as "Gluten-Free" means your products must aspire to (zero) 0 ppm of total weight of the item. Sourcing of ingredients, processing methods that reduce potential cross contamination must also be used to maintain the minimum allowance. GFS Labs research and current testing methods has reached 1 ppm as the lowest possible scale of testable limit. However that 1ppm test only tests one aspect of the chemical chain in gluten. If the other aspects in the chain are there ill effects can still occur.

The chemical structure of Gluten is broken down into 4 parts. Each one of these parts requires its own test. If a product tests at 1 ppm of A5 it is still potentially dangerous if it still contains B4, B5 and C. Example: If A5 tests at 3ppm, B4 tests at 1.5ppm, B5 tests at 5ppm and C tests at 1 ppm, can't the test results be averaged? It could for some other certifier, but not for us. We take the highest level of test which in this example is 5ppm and the product is then certified at Variance 2 of our program. The processor could re-test if they chose to resource an ingredient or two, which could make the difference but that's the producer's choice. Our job is to simply report the truth of the product.

Chemical Structure of Gluten:

Gluten exorphin A5
Structure: H-Gly-Tyr-Tyr-Pro-Thr-OH
Chemical formula: C29H37N5O9
Molecular weight: 599.64 g/mol

Gluten exorphin B4
Structure: H-Tyr-Gly-Gly-Trp-OH
Chemical formula: C24H27N5O6
Molecular weight: 481.50 g/mol

Gluten exorphin B5
Structure: H-Tyr-Gly-Gly-Trp-Leu-OH
Chemical formula: C30H38N6O7
Molecular weight: 594.66 g/mol

Gluten exorphin C
Structure: H-Tyr-Pro-Ile-Ser-Leu-OH
Chemical formula: C29H45N5O8
Molecular weight: 591.70 g/mol

For the longest time it has been hypothesized that 10 ppm is the magic number if the minimum requirement is 20ppm. It's really an assumption that anything less than 20ppm is best. In some cases 1 in 20,000 have reported that 10ppm has led to episodes for those who have advanced stages of Celiac Disease. It's part GFS Labs overall philosophy that the safest level of gluten clinically testable is 3 ppm. GFS Labs feel confident that when they test a product that produces a 3 ppm result it might actually be less or even zero, but GFS Labs allow the product that extra 1.5 ppm just to be safe. Therefore, it is our position that the standard we advocate is to the European standard, anything less than 20 ppm is safe per that standard, but which would the consumer feel safer with: 20 ppm, 10 ppm or 3 ppm?

How do we arrive at our level of testing?
GFS Labs is an A2LA Accredited Laboratory. GFS Labs test, as mentioned above, utilizes four levels of vetting all referred to as plate testing, they use a 96 pool plate method and test through four levels of chemical testing to arrive at 1ppm, 1.5ppm and 3ppm. In order to have a base measure, there must be the presence of glutian protein, without it we would be testing air, which for them isn't measurable. If a product tests negative, four out of four levels, it has met our minimum requirement for Variance 1 Certification.

GFS Labs only allows those that test at 3 Parts Per Million to afix our Gluten Free Certified Logo on the front of their menu item or food packaging. Those that test between 20 ppm and 5 ppm are permitted to use a special 20PPM GFS Logo and make the following claim under the Nutritional Facts information "This product has been tested to contain less than 20 ppm of Gluten" because the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has yet to stipulate a legal limit, liability rests on the Certifier/Auditor and the Producer for being as transparent as possible to the consumer.