A veterinarian, a physician and an environmental scientist walk into a bar... It sounds like the beginning of a bad joke, but in reality, it could be the beginning of great idea. The causes of today’s most pressing problems - such as the climate crisis, hunger, poverty and pandemic disease - are extremely complex, and interrelated.  With these words Jeffrey LeJeune, FAO Food Safety Officer, began to explain what One Health is all about and how it releates to food safety. One Health provides an opportunity for people of different sectors and disciplines to join together to promote better health...

Vittorio Fattori, FAO Food Safety Officer, and Keya Mukherjee, FAO Food Safety Specialist, recently gave a talk at the United States Government Global Nutrition Coordination Plan Food Safety Technical Working Group meeting. The focus of the talk was to discuss the multi-faceted impacts of climate change on various foodborne hazards globally, and how achieving food security will not be possible without paying due attention to food safety. The talk was based on the findings of a recent FAO report on the topic. Elevated temperatures, changes in water availability, deteriorating soil quality, extreme weather events, rising sea levels and ocean acidification all...

Jorge Pinto Ferreira, FAO Food Safety Officer, gave an online presentation, on 16 October 2021, during the 3rd International Conference of the European College of Veterinary Microbiology (ECVM). The topic of the talk was Antimicrobial Resistance (AMR), with a particular focus on some of the highlights of FAO’s work on AMR and Antimicrobial Use (AMU) surveillance. The need for harmonized related standards was emphasized. As part of its AMR Action Plan, FAO seeks to increase stakeholder awareness and engagement, and different possibilities for collaboration opportunities with this European college were presented. Read more about the ECVM Find out about FAO’s...

A recent graduate of the University of Bristol with a degree in biology, Hana Azuma, who comes from Japan, has joined the FAO Food Safety team as a food safety and biosafety intern to work on various projects. Working on some of the highly scientific projects such as safety assurance of food produced through various innovative methods is one of her future ambitions. In this interview, she explains how she developed a passion for working toward ‘Zero Hunger’ and how improving plant production with biotechnologies could help with that. -          How did you develop an interest in food safety? Food production must increase...

Jorge Pinto Ferreira, FAO Food Safety Officer, gave an online presentation to Portuguese veterinary students, on 2 October 2021, during the “VIII Jornadas Multidisciplinares”, promoted by the student association of the University of Évora in Portugal. The topic of the talk was Antimicrobial Resistance (AMR), with a particular focus on the multi-disciplinary approach needed to face this significant global public health issue. Students were surprised and interested to learn that the disciplines involved go way beyond human medicine or veterinary medicine (as they initially thought), and include a broad range of disciplines, including social sciences such as anthropology, sociology and psychology. ...

Food safety generates substantial interest in China, which is the country with the largest population in the world and also one of the largest food exporters and importers. Over the past years, the country committed to improve its food safety by establishing a food safety law and a food safety control system. In 2019, a decade after the China food safety law had come into force, the pilot project to establish national food safety indicators was launched to evaluate its effectiveness. Information about the project is now available in the project report entitled “Food safety indicator pilot project in...

As the Codex Committee on Food Labelling gathers for its 46th session, we spoke with Christine Kopko, FAO Food Safety Officer, about the assurance that labels bring to consumers and the importance of international approaches to indicating what is in our food products.  Why should consumers read food labels?  I think, as kids, we spent a lot of time unconsciously reading the cereal box as we slurped our breakfast during our morning routine. In fact, just the other day, I caught my teens comparing the fibre content in the respective cereal choices rather than their normal “who’s who on TikTok”...

A meeting of experts, convened by FAO and WHO, is now underway to collect, review and discuss the measures necessary to reduce the risk of microbial contamination in fresh fruits and vegetables, including leafy greens. The FAO/WHO Joint Meeting Expert Meeting on the Prevention and Control of Microbiological Hazards in Fresh Fruits and Vegetables is looking at aspects of primary production (in open fields or in protected facilities such as high and low tunnels, greenhouses, net houses as well as hydroponic and aquaponics systems). The purpose is to identify and evaluate solutions to reduce foodborne illnesses associated with fresh fruits and...

Parasites in food can infect in humans via the consumption of contaminated vegetables or animal food products, such as pork, raw fish or crustaceans, and they can lead to severe human health problems. While it may not be common to see this topic addressed, knowing how parasites are transmitted,the effects they can have, and any preventive measures can be extremely beneficial. The FAO Regional Office for Asia and the Pacific, as part of the tripartite with the World Health Organization (WHO) and the World Organisation for Animal Health (OIE), published a set of one-page leaflets on some parasitic diseases, namely Clonorchiasis and...

FAO and WHO have released a publication, now available in six languages, that encapsulates what transpired on World Food Safety Day (7 June 2021). The 24-page report, entitled World Food Safety Day 2021 - An overview of festivity and creativity, offers a glimpse into the impressive array of events, initiatives and campaigns organized by government authorities, private sector actors, academics, schools and others in around 90 countries. There were countless virtual events again this year, at local, national, regional and global level and the scale of many of these events was only possible because of the wonders of the internet. “World...