The Code E-330 in the European Union, denotes which organic compound?

Citric acid is a colorless and crystalline organic compound. First isolated in 1784 from lemon juice by the Swedish chemist Carl Wilhelm Scheele. It has been used as a food additive for over 100 years. E numbers are codes for substances that are permitted to be used as food additives for use within the European Union.The ''E'' stands for ''Europe''. It is commonly found on food labels.The safety assessment and approval are the responsibility of the European Food Safety Authority. In 1964, the directives for preservatives were added,1970 for antioxidants and 1974 for the emulsifiers, stabilisers, thickeners, and gelling agents. Regarding food coloring in the United states, the pure food and drug act of 1906 reduced the permitted list of synthetic colors from 700 down to seven. The numbering scheme follows that of the International Numbering System (INS) as determined by the Codex Alimentarius committee.The subset of the INS additives are approved for use in the European Union as food additives.

In some European countries, ''E number'' is sometimes used informally as a pejorative term for artificial food additives.The products may promote themselves as ''free of E numbers''.But this is incorrect, because many components of natural foods have E numbers (and the number is a synonym for the chemical component), e.g. vitamin C (E300) and lycopene (E160d).