Opening Plenary Session
What’s next for food safety assessments?
Food safety assessments play a crucial role in ensuring that food (including feed and derived products) stays safe. Being at the interface between science, society and policy, such assessments have been impacted by many abrupt changes including rapid technological and scientific developments, globalisation, global warming, societal expectations and new policy targets. Besides creating opportunities, these changes also pose critical challenges for food safety science. To ensure that food safety assessments remain fit for purpose, and continue to protect human, animal, plant and environmental health and animal welfare, they will need further advancement. This plenary session will explore how food safety science may be impacted by complexity and change, and how it will need to develop to respond to a fast-changing environment and get prepared to the challenges ahead. We will explore scenarios for the future of food systems, food safety, engagement and communication. Specific emphasis will be placed on the One Health approach in an effort to develop more integrated, cross-sectoral and collaborative health assessments. This plenary session will also set the scene for in-depth discussions that will continue in the thematic (break-out) sessions of the Conference.
Vision
The safety of the food chain from farm to fork is at the core of EFSA’s mission. With its food safety assessments, EFSA – together with EU Member States – contributes to the protection of human, animal, plant and environmental health and animal welfare. The ambition to advance food safety assessments to ensure they remain fit for purpose in the face of a changing environment is at the heart of EFSA’s Strategy 2027.
EFSA’s Strategy 2027 emphasises that new approaches to food safety are required to meet societal ambitions and policy targets for more nutritious and sustainable food, without compromising on food safety. To this end, we will explore how a One Health approach could help to deliver more integrated, cross-sectoral and collaborative health assessments that go beyond the traditional boundaries that separate scientific disciplines and organisations, and involve new stakeholders.
Background – Challenges and opportunities
Safe, nutritious and sustainable food (including feed and derived products) is essential to sustain life and our planet, and to promote good health. While food safety assessments play a crucial role in ensuring that food stays safe, they have been impacted by many unprecedented and abrupt changes across many fields. Such changes include: technological innovations in the agricultural and food sector and beyond; increased scientific complexity; an exponential growth in data; artificial intelligence and enhanced computing power; public expectations of greater transparency, openness and engagement in risk assessment processes; societal demands for a food system that delivers nutritious food for all in a sustainable way; emerging risks and new hazards; new policy targets; and the impact of international trade, globalisation, environmental degradation and global warming. Besides creating opportunities, these changes also pose new challenges for food safety science.
To keep pace with a fast-moving world, there is a need to advance food safety assessments to ensure they remain fit for purpose, and continue to protect human, animal, plant and environmental health and animal welfare. Instead of solving problems individually, better cooperation between established food safety actors and beyond is needed to co-design, develop and implement new and more sophisticated approaches. By doing this, we can harness the benefits of an ecosystem that goes beyond traditional boundaries that separate scientific disciplines and organisations, thus combining the necessary knowledge, expertise and data to keep food safe, while making it more nutritious and sustainable.
Scope and objectives
Operating at the interface between science, society and policy, food safety assessments have been impacted by many changes across different fields. Continuous advancements will ensure that food safety assessments remain fit for purpose, and continue to protect human, animal, plant and environmental health and animal welfare.
The main objectives of the plenary session are to:
- Present scenarios for the future of food systems, food safety, engagement and communication; .
- Address how food safety science is impacted by complexity and change, and how it will need to develop to respond to a changing environment and get prepared to the challenges ahead;
- Discuss how taking a One Health approach can help to deliver more integrated, cross-sectoral and collaborative health assessments that go beyond traditional boundaries that separate scientific disciplines and organisations;
- Set the scene for in-depth discussions that will continue in the thematic sessions of the Conference.
Opening ceremony
| Time | Duration | Talk |
|---|---|---|
| 14:00 | 30 |
Opening address Bernhard Url, European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) | Stella Kyriakides, European Commission |
Plenary session “What’s next for food safety assessments?
| Time | Duration | Talk |
|---|---|---|
| 14:30 | 5 |
Welcome and introduction Barbara Gallani, European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) |
Part I - The challenge of change: staying relevant in a fast-moving world
| Time | Duration | Talk |
|---|---|---|
| 14:35 | 15 |
From safe food to sustainable food systems Jessica Fanzo, Johns Hopkins University |
| 14:50 | 10 |
Having it all: can food be safe, nutritious and sustainable? Glindys Virginia Luciano, Young Professionals for Agricultural Development (YPARD) |
| 15:00 | 10 |
Actions speak loudest: the battle for trust Frank Yiannas, U.S. Food and Drug Administration |
| 15:10 | 10 |
Fighting with facts: the future of science communication Jacqueline EW Broerse, Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam |
| 15:20 | 10 |
Together is better: engagement in risk assessment Sarah A Hartley, University of Exeter |
| 15:30 | 30 |
Coffee break |
Part II - Science without frontiers: the case for integrated and collaborative health assessments
| Time | Duration | Talk |
|---|---|---|
| 16:00 | 5 |
Welcome to Part 2 Barbara Gallani, European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) |
| 16:05 | 15 |
One Health as integrative approach. No more walls: why we must go forward together Patrick Wall, University College Dublin |
| 16:20 | 65 |
Panel discussion moderated by Rose O' Donovan Claire Bury, European Commission | Jytte Guteland, European Parliament | Monique Goyens, The European Consumer Organisation (BEUC) | Dirk Jacobs, FoodDrinkEurope | Milka Sokolović, European Public Health Alliance (EPHA) | Bernhard Url, European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) |
| 17:25 | 10 |
Wrap up and concluding remarks Barbara Gallani, European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) |