Asian backing for food safety initiative

The Global Food Safety Partnership, a World Bank initiative facilitated by Massey University, has won the support of Food Industry Asia. The initiative is a public-private partnership aimed at increasing food safety capacity

Food Industry Asia executive director Bev Postma says food safety is integral to ensuring people have access to sufficient, safe and nutritious food at all times. "Having safe food standards is also key to the agri-food trade, especially with today's highly globalised food supply chain.

"FIA recognises the importance of food safety, and is proud to be part of this collaborative and integrated effort to develop better food safety and quality standards.

"We believe this partnership is a great initiative aimed at filling critical capacity building gaps, and we look forward to working with our global and regional stakeholders to improve food safety standards for the benefits of food producers, regulators and consumers," she says.

Massey University Professor of Agribusiness Hamish Gow, who has a leadership role in the partnership, says the FIA's decision to join the GFSP is good for the New Zealand agri-food sector.
"FIA, as the major food industry association across Asia – New Zealand's most important food and beverage export region – plays a critical role in ensuring the continued progression towards the establishment of a level playing field for food exports, building public and private food safety capacity to support markets, and collaborating with its public and private members to minimise the potential impact of any food safety incidents that may occur," he says.

"New Zealand's recent adverse food safety experiences point to the need for substantial capacity building to occur across the region. FIA's membership of the GFSP provides a strong signal that the Asian food and beverage sector is serious about sorting out food safety."

Established in December, the partnership is a unique platform to improve the safety of the global food supply chain. The partnership will utilise an open educational model that would enable individuals, firms, non-governmental organisations, governments and international agencies to collaborate.

Massey University will facilitate the working groups that will provide technical input and expertise into the design of the partnership and associated programmes. These working groups will cover the establishment of the open source platform (or information resource), an effective monitoring and evaluation framework, and food safety technical aspects including training materials, quality control, service provision and delivery systems.