Specifications
A permitted list says an additive may be used. A specification says what the substance has to be before it counts as that additive at all: how it is made, what it must assay at, and how much lead, arsenic, mercury or cadmium it may carry. Two bodies write them for the same substances. The European Union sets its specifications by regulation, so they bind. JECFA publishes its own through FAO, and they are advisory until a country adopts them.
283 additives on this site carry both documents. On 88 of them at least one figure differs, and on 66 the difference is a ceiling on a contaminant — where a lower figure is unambiguously the stricter one.
Where the contaminant ceilings differ
93 ceilings across 66 additives. The EU sets the lower figure on 87 of them. That is a difference in documents and their revision dates, not a finding by either body about the other: a specification is revised when the body that owns it revises it, and neither is obliged to follow the other.
| Additive | Parameter | European Union | JECFA | Lower |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Acetic acid | Lead | 0.5 mg/kg | 2 mg/kg | EU |
| Aluminium | Lead | 10 mg/kg | 20 mg/kg | EU |
| Annatto extracts, bixin-based | Lead | 1 mg/kg | 2 mg/kg | EU |
| ″ | Arsenic | 2 mg/kg | 3 mg/kg | EU |
| Annatto extracts, norbixin-based | Lead | 1 mg/kg | 2 mg/kg | EU |
| ″ | Arsenic | 2 mg/kg | 3 mg/kg | EU |
| Calcium citrate | Lead | 1 mg/kg | 2 mg/kg | EU |
| Calcium dihydrogen diphosphate | Lead | 1 mg/kg | 4 mg/kg | EU |
| ″ | Arsenic | 1 mg/kg | 3 mg/kg | EU |
| Calcium hydrogen phosphate | Lead | 1 mg/kg | 4 mg/kg | EU |
| ″ | Arsenic | 1 mg/kg | 3 mg/kg | EU |
| Calcium phosphate | Lead | 1 mg/kg | 4 mg/kg | EU |
| Calcium polyphosphate | Lead | 1 mg/kg | 4 mg/kg | EU |
| ″ | Arsenic | 1 mg/kg | 3 mg/kg | EU |
| Calcium pyrophosphate | Lead | 1 mg/kg | 4 mg/kg | EU |
| ″ | Arsenic | 1 mg/kg | 3 mg/kg | EU |
| Carmines | Lead | 1.5 mg/kg | 5 mg/kg | EU |
| Carob bean gum | Lead | 0.4 mg/kg | 2 mg/kg | EU |
| ″ | Arsenic | 0.1 mg/kg | 3 mg/kg | EU |
| Chlorophylls, copper complexes | Lead | 2 mg/kg | 5 mg/kg | EU |
| Cross-linked sodium carboxymethyl cellulose (Cross-linked-cellulose gum) | Lead | 0.1 mg/kg | 2 mg/kg | EU |
| Curcumin | Lead | 10 mg/kg | 2 mg/kg | JECFA |
| Dipotassium phosphate | Lead | 1 mg/kg | 4 mg/kg | EU |
| ″ | Arsenic | 1 mg/kg | 3 mg/kg | EU |
| Disodium phosphate | Lead | 1 mg/kg | 4 mg/kg | EU |
| ″ | Arsenic | 1 mg/kg | 3 mg/kg | EU |
| Ethyl cellulose | Lead | 0.5 mg/kg | 2 mg/kg | EU |
| Glucono delta-lactone | Lead | 1 mg/kg | 2 mg/kg | EU |
| Glycerin | Lead | 0.1 mg/kg | 2 mg/kg | EU |
| Glycerol ester of wood rosin | Lead | 2 mg/kg | 1 mg/kg | JECFA |
| Guar gum | Lead | 0.2 mg/kg | 2 mg/kg | EU |
| Gum arabic (Acacia gum) | Lead | 0.05 mg/kg | 2 mg/kg | EU |
| Hydroxypropyl cellulose | Lead | 0.5 mg/kg | 2 mg/kg | EU |
| Hydroxypropyl methylcellulose | Lead | 0.1 mg/kg | 2 mg/kg | EU |
| Lutein from Tagetes erecta | Lead | 3 mg/kg | 5 mg/kg | EU |
| Lysozyme | Lead | 5 mg/kg | 2 mg/kg | JECFA |
| Magnesium dihydrogen phosphate | Lead | 1 mg/kg | 4 mg/kg | EU |
| ″ | Arsenic | 1 mg/kg | 3 mg/kg | EU |
| Methyl cellulose | Lead | 0.1 mg/kg | 2 mg/kg | EU |
| Methyl ethyl cellulose | Lead | 0.1 mg/kg | 2 mg/kg | EU |
| Mono- and di-glycerides of fatty acids | Lead | 0.1 mg/kg | 2 mg/kg | EU |
| Monobasic calcium phosphate | Lead | 1 mg/kg | 4 mg/kg | EU |
| ″ | Arsenic | 1 mg/kg | 3 mg/kg | EU |
| Natamycin (pimaricin) | Arsenic | 3 mg/kg | 1 mg/kg | JECFA |
| Pectins | Lead | 0.3 mg/kg | 2 mg/kg | EU |
| Phosphated distarch phosphate | Lead | 2 mg/kg | 0.2 mg/kg | JECFA |
| Phosphoric acid | Lead | 1 mg/kg | 4 mg/kg | EU |
| ″ | Arsenic | 1 mg/kg | 3 mg/kg | EU |
| Polyglycerol esters of fatty acids | Lead | 0.3 mg/kg | 0.5 mg/kg | EU |
| ″ | Arsenic | 0.1 mg/kg | 0.2 mg/kg | EU |
| ″ | Mercury | 0.1 mg/kg | 0.5 mg/kg | EU |
| ″ | Cadmium | 0.1 mg/kg | 0.2 mg/kg | EU |
| Polyglycerol esters of interesterified ricinoleic acid | Lead | 0.1 mg/kg | 2 mg/kg | EU |
| Potassium dihydrogen citrate | Lead | 1 mg/kg | 2 mg/kg | EU |
| Potassium dihydrogen phosphate | Lead | 1 mg/kg | 4 mg/kg | EU |
| ″ | Arsenic | 1 mg/kg | 3 mg/kg | EU |
| Potassium nitrate | Lead | 0.1 mg/kg | 2 mg/kg | EU |
| Potassium nitrite | Lead | 0.1 mg/kg | 2 mg/kg | EU |
| Potassium polyphosphate | Lead | 1 mg/kg | 4 mg/kg | EU |
| ″ | Arsenic | 1 mg/kg | 3 mg/kg | EU |
| Potassium sorbate | Lead | 0.1 mg/kg | 2 mg/kg | EU |
| Powdered cellulose | Lead | 0.3 mg/kg | 2 mg/kg | EU |
| Propyl gallate | Lead | 0.3 mg/kg | 2 mg/kg | EU |
| Sodium acid phosphate | Lead | 1 mg/kg | 4 mg/kg | EU |
| ″ | Arsenic | 1 mg/kg | 3 mg/kg | EU |
| Sodium acid pyrophosphate | Lead | 1 mg/kg | 4 mg/kg | EU |
| ″ | Arsenic | 1 mg/kg | 3 mg/kg | EU |
| Sodium aluminium phosphate, acidic | Lead | 4 mg/kg | 2 mg/kg | JECFA |
| Sodium calcium polyphosphate | Lead | 1 mg/kg | 4 mg/kg | EU |
| ″ | Arsenic | 1 mg/kg | 3 mg/kg | EU |
| Sodium carboxymethyl cellulose, enzymatically hydrolysed (Cellulose gum, enzymatically hydrolyzed) | Lead | 0.1 mg/kg | 3 mg/kg | EU |
| Sodium carboxymethylcellulose | Lead | 0.1 mg/kg | 2 mg/kg | EU |
| Sodium gluconate | Lead | 1 mg/kg | 2 mg/kg | EU |
| Sodium hydroxide | Lead | 0.5 mg/kg | 2 mg/kg | EU |
| Sodium nitrate | Lead | 0.1 mg/kg | 2 mg/kg | EU |
| Sodium nitrite | Lead | 0.1 mg/kg | 2 mg/kg | EU |
| Sodium polyphosphate | Lead | 1 mg/kg | 4 mg/kg | EU |
| ″ | Arsenic | 1 mg/kg | 3 mg/kg | EU |
| Sodium pyrophosphate | Lead | 1 mg/kg | 4 mg/kg | EU |
| ″ | Arsenic | 1 mg/kg | 3 mg/kg | EU |
| Sodium tripolyphosphate | Lead | 1 mg/kg | 4 mg/kg | EU |
| ″ | Arsenic | 1 mg/kg | 3 mg/kg | EU |
| Sorbic acid | Lead | 0.1 mg/kg | 2 mg/kg | EU |
| Tetrapotassium pyrophosphate | Lead | 1 mg/kg | 4 mg/kg | EU |
| ″ | Arsenic | 1 mg/kg | 3 mg/kg | EU |
| Tripotassium citrate | Lead | 1 mg/kg | 2 mg/kg | EU |
| Tripotassium phosphate | Lead | 1 mg/kg | 4 mg/kg | EU |
| ″ | Arsenic | 1 mg/kg | 3 mg/kg | EU |
| Trisodium diphosphate | Lead | 1 mg/kg | 4 mg/kg | EU |
| ″ | Arsenic | 1 mg/kg | 3 mg/kg | EU |
| Trisodium phosphate | Lead | 1 mg/kg | 4 mg/kg | EU |
| ″ | Arsenic | 1 mg/kg | 3 mg/kg | EU |
| Xanthan gum | Lead | 0.5 mg/kg | 2 mg/kg | EU |
What is and is not compared
Only the parameters both documents put a number on: assay, loss on drying, sulphated ash, lead, arsenic, mercury, cadmium. Everything else in a specification — the definition, the identification tests, the methods — is prose written to different conventions, and setting two paragraphs side by side and calling the difference a finding would be a worse error than saying nothing.
Among the numbers, only the contaminant ceilings are ranked. JECFA's assay for annatto is 25 % where the EU's is 85 %, and for alpha-tocopherol 40 % against 96 %, because the two documents specify different preparations of the substance — not because JECFA would accept a quarter-strength colour. Those rows appear on each additive's page with both figures and no verdict.
EU specifications retrieved 2026-10-18, from Regulation (EU) No 231/2012 as amended. JECFA specifications retrieved 2026-09-23, © FAO, reproduced for a non-commercial service with acknowledgement; monographs carrying a joint notice are acknowledged to FAO and WHO. Neither body's endorsement is stated or implied. See Sources and the glossary.