“INFOSAN has proven as a practical and effective tool for allowing us to implement risk management measures to prevent foodborne illness and save lives.” said Dr Naoko Yamamoto, WHO Assistant Director-General in her video message delivered at the opening ceremony of the Second Global Meeting of the International Food Safety Authorities Network (INFOSAN).
During 9-11 December 2019, some 250 representatives from more than 130 countries gathered in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates to participate in the Second Global Meeting of the International Food Safety Authorities Network(INFOSAN). This meeting was organized by the World Health Organization (WHO) and the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), and hosted by the Abu Dhabi Agriculture and Food Safety Authority (ADAFSA).
Participants came out of the meeting with a strengthened sense of community and willingness to collaborate and share information during food safety emergencies.
“This meeting is a great opportunity for people to meet, to network and collaborate, to exchange experiences, and to plan for future projects” remarked Caroline Merten, INFOSAN Advisory Group Member and Scientific Officer at the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA).
“INFOSAN has developed immensely over the last 15 years.” - Alan Reilly
INFOSAN was established in 2004 and now boasts more than 600 members from 190 countries. “We have more members than ever, and members are being more active as well, so we see the response rate is getting better,“ said Peter Sousa Hoejskov, Food Safety Advisor in the WHO European Region, in reference to requests for information during food safety incidents.
“INFOSAN is making a positive difference in terms of preventing foodborne illness” said Diego Varela, INFOSAN Advisory Group Member and Officer at ACHIPIA, the Food Safety and Quality Agency of Chile.
INFOSAN promotes the rapid exchange of information between countries to reduce the public health and socio-economic impact of foodborne disease outbreaks, or contaminated food that needs to be removed from the market. “The successes that INFOSAN had in bringing some of the major outbreaks of global foodborne illnesses into conclusion has been absolutely brilliant” said Alan Reilly, INFOSAN Advisory Group Member and Professor at University College Dublin, Ireland.
“INFOSAN is a tool that countries can use to improve the capacity to respond and investigate food safety incidents and emergencies.” - Peter Sousa Hoejskov
The participants reiterated the recognition of INFOSAN as the global network for the management of food emergencies, and emphasized that global meetings such as this provide a unique forum for food safety managers to exchange experiences and knowledge.
Through facilitated group discussions, regional differences were recognised and concrete actions identified to overcome current barriers limiting more active participation. “Regions and countries can work together, share information, protect consumer health by using the platform of INFOSAN” said Alan Reilly.
Zainab Jallow from Gambia and member of the INFOSAN Advisory Group remarked that “With the INFOSAN Community Website, we know who the members are, who has access, who we can trust, where the information comes from, and that all we're getting is legitimate.”
Cristina Baptista Rodrigues, INFOSAN Emergency Contact Point in Portugal noted the importance of INFOSAN in connecting members with common interests from different countries, “INFOSAN became a really important part of our work as we want to develop a connection between the food safety agencies in the Portuguese-speaking countries. So this is why we approached INFOSAN, to use the platform to create a group that made the connection between the food safety agencies of the Portuguese speaking countries.”
“INFOSAN becomes more specialized.” - Jan Baele
The meeting provided an opportunity for the members to be exposed to, and discuss new common challenges faced by food safety managers worldwide. Among others, tackling the global spread of food fraud and the increased use of E-commerce requires new skills and approaches for traceability and food safety management. “Artificial intelligence, machine learning and the use of big data will have a profound impact on food production, food control and outbreak investigation in the future and food safety managers need to prepare themselves.” said Peter BenEmbarek, INFOSAN Secretariat, WHO. The increased use of whole genome sequencing is seen as a revolution that is changing how outbreak investigation and foodborne disease surveillance is being conducted. “With these new changes, international collaboration and sharing of experiences is crucial, particularly for developing countries.” noted Joergen Schlundt, INFOSAN Advisory Group member and Professor Food Science at Nanyang Technological University, Singapore.
He also added: “With further discussion, I hope we could efficiently set up a global database of all whole genome sequences of all microorganisms in the world and that would be really helpful to everyone and not the least to developing countries. So I think this is the big one: the whole genome sequencing and how we use that in the future.”
“Sharing information helps to build a global community.” - Caroline Merten
The meeting concluded with a call for more collaboration and openness in the sharing of information between food safety managers. The participants identified a series of concrete actions for both members of the network and the INFOSAN Secretariat, and for FAO and WHO to continue to strengthen international collaboration and better use the network to its full potential.
“We also heard many other good suggestions for future development for INFOSAN, such as the possibility to give more ownership to INFOSAN members, so that they can develop at the national level, clear guidance on how they can collaborate together” said Caroline Merten, “but also in relation to non-emergency activities, there is a huge potential for INFOSAN to develop further in the future and to take on board the suggestions which were given during the group discussion, such as providing training and building closer collaboration and communication on non-emergency activities, such as surveillance activities and risk assessment activities at national levels. If these are shared during non-emergency time, that helps in building a community.” she added.
“The large turnout and the lively discussions during the three days of the meeting have demonstrated the commitment of INFOSAN members, the dynamic nature of the network and its recognised utility as we all work together towards improving food safety worldwide. We return home inspired, with a long list of new ideas and actions to further strengthen INFOSAN!” concluded Carmen Savelli from the INFOSAN Secretariat, WHO.