News

Food safety is embedded in the food-related problems that society faces and the solutions being proposed for them.

In June 2018, SAFE consortium released a one-pager on food safety priorities related to the global challenges being addressed by Framework Programme 9. The paper was distributed to the FP9 Programme Committee and European Commission officials.

This SAFE consortium one-pager was co-authored by 10 individual SAFE members from 7 different SAFE member institutes located throughout Europe.

In January 2018, a joint declaration was issued to transform the food sector in Europe into a more competitive, sustainable and trusted sector, to secure the production of safe and nutritious food that every consumer loves. The declaration was sent to President Juncker.

Six organisations authored this initiative, including FOODforce in which SAFE consortium is active as an Associated Organisation. The other authors were: EFFoST, EITFood, FoodDrinkEurope, FoodNexus and FoodForLife. The declaration is hosted by the FoodDrinkEurope website, link here, where it is still possible to add an endorsement.

Read the Declaration here.

Read the SAFE consortium Endorsement here.

See the list of Endorsers here.

April 2018 release of a summary paper from the October 2017 SAFE consortium food safety workshop, "Natural and Microbial Food Contaminant: Riskier Than We Think?". Read it here.

This 4-page glossy is from the 1 1/2 hour workshop which featured the European Commissioner for Health and Food Safety, Vytenis Andriukaitis as keynote speaker and the Member of European Parliament Christofer Fjellner as host.

Read more about the workshop here, including links to presentations and related publications.

See the 3 1/2 minute summary video of the workshop here.

January 2018 release of the highlight video from the October 2017 SAFE consortium food safety workshop, 'Natural and Microbial Food Contaminants: Riskier Than We Think?'. Watch 3 1/2 minutes of highlights from the 1 1/2 hour workshop featuring Member of European Parliament Christofer Fjellner and European Commissioner for Health & Food Safety Vytenis Andriukaitis.

See the 3.5 minute video here.

The following three institutes were accepted as full members of the SAFE consortium at the December 2017 Annual General Member's Meeting:

The Faculty of Biotechnology and Food Sciences of the Slovak University of Agriculture in Nitra (SUA).

The Food Institute of Kaunas University of Technology (KTU) in Lithuania.

The Institute of Life Technologies of the School of Engineering of the University of Applied Sciences of Western Switzerland-Valais Wallis (HES-SO).

These institutes are free to publish in the public interest and each presented a bibliography of high quality publications in international peer-reviewed scientific journals authored by numerous scientists at their respective institutes.

The memberships begin January 2018 and we look forward to successful collaboration. Welcome!

SAFE consortium was invited to join the ongoing COST Action ActInPak, Active and Intelligent Fibre-Based Packaging in January 2017. SAFE brings its expertise in European food safety to this packaging initiative.

Many thanks to the Action Leader, Sanne Tiekstra of Bumaga NL for the invitation.

SAFE partnered with the Science and Technology Options Assessment (STOA) panel of the European Parliament to organise a holistic workshop on food safety issues of today.

The 20 October 2016 workshop was widely viewed as a success, with expert speakers from academia, industry, national research centres and the European Commission and over 100 attendees.

Read about the workshop, including a link to the presentations here.

SAFE consortium, with a generous partial sponsorship from BASF SE, wrote an engaging and readable summary of the event which was published in February 2017.

Download the Workshop Summary here.

Read the Workshop Summary on ISSUU here.

At the 2016 SAFE consortium Annual General Meeting, Dr. Hrönn Jörundsdóttir, Ph.D. in chemistry and Chief Infrastructure Officer at Matís, Icelandic Food and Biotech R&D, was approved by SAFE members as the new Secretary General of The European Association for Food Safety, SAFE consortium. She had been nominated by the Executive Board earlier in the year. Dr. Jörundsdóttir will replace Oddur M. Gunnarsson who is stepping down after 5+ years of service to the consortium.

Read more...

In July 2016, SAFE consortium joined over 20 other groups in becoming a Supporting Organization of the Global Harmonization Initiative, GHI. GHI is an international non-profit network to promote harmonization of global food safety regulations and legislation.

Read more...

FOODforce is a network of leading European research provider organisations active in the areas of food, nutrition and health.

As of June 2016, SAFE consortium is now active as an Associated Organisation with this important network. SAFE contributed to the FOODforce Position Paper released in summer 2016 and to the FOODforce response to the Public Consultation on Horizon 2020 Societal Challenge 2, "Food security, sustainable agriculture and forestry, marine and maritime and inland water research and the bioeconomy".

In June 2016, The Norwegian National Institute of Nutrition and Seafood Research (NIFES) became a full member of The European Association for Food Safety, SAFE consortium. NIFES conducts research on the seafood you eat. The institute studies fish nutrition and the effects of fish and seafood consumption on our health.

Read more about NIFES here.

The European Association for Food Safety, SAFE consortium announces the publication of its newest position paper,

Safe Food for the Future

released 29 April 2016.

Read the position paper on ISSUU, here or download the pdf from the SAFE site, Publications, here.

You can read and download this and other SAFE publications on ISSUU or at the Publications tab.

The SAFE consortium was elected as a member of the Stakeholder Advisory Board of the Joint Programming Initiative (JPI) on Agriculture, Food Security and Climate Change (FACCE) effective January 2016. SAFE joins 15 other food and climate stakeholders in providing advice to increase the relevance of FACCE-JPI work and suggesting ways to further dissemination and impact.

The SAFE consortium representative to the Stakeholder Advisory Board is Irina Smeu of SAFE member IBA in Romania. Read more about IBA here.

Read about the FACCE-JPI here.

The 10th annual Global Food Safety Summit focused on managing a safe and secure global food supply chain. The event took place in Amsterdam on 8 and 9 September 2015 with approximately 150 attendees, many from leading companies in the food and beverage industry. For the 3rd consecutive year SAFE consortium was a promotional partner for the event and was represented by the attendance of Oddur M. Gunnarsson, SAFE Secretary General and by two SAFE member institutes: Nofima and Nestlé.

Read more...

The Norwegian Veterinary Institute became a member of the SAFE consortium as of September 2015. Read about the Institute and their activities here.

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The SAFE consortium Position Paper,

"Food Safety: The Top Priority on the Horizon for the SAFE Consortium"

was covered by FoodQualityNews reporter Joe Whitworth in an article published on 5 August 2015.

Read the article here.

Members of the European Association for Food Safety, SAFE consortium decided last week to reduce membership fees, especially for smaller organisations, in an effort to increase membership. SAFE consortium is a fully independent food safety voice, counting 10 member institutes in 2015, and funded by their annual dues. Dues will be cut in half for some, as the new structure is €1000 per year for academic and governmental organisations with less than 250 employees and €2000 for those with over 250. Several of the smaller SAFE members applauded the change, with Tim Hogg of the School of Biotechnology of the Catholic University of Portugal noting, “The SAFE model of influencing financing for food safety research is useful and we want to stay a part of that.”

Read more...

SAFE consortium dissemination for 2013-2014 : view the summary here.

The SAFE Consortium announces the publication of its newest position paper:

Food Safety: The top priority on the horizon for the SAFE consortium.

Read the position paper on ISSUU, here.

You can also read and download this and other SAFE publications on ISSUU or on the SAFE consortium Publications link here.

The SAFE consortium is again in the food press. A recent article in Food Quality & Safety is all about the SAFE consortium.

SAFE: A Self-Sustaining Platform for European Research - ONLINE EXCLUSIVE.

Read the article here.

This article is part of a larger piece, Food Safety in Europe, by the same author, Linda L. Leake, read the full article here.