The Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) economies have agreed to continue their efforts in strengthening food safety capacity building activities and improving food safety information sharing across the region.
Briefing on Monday about the outcome of the APEC Food Safety Cooperation Forum (FSCF), which was held here in the margins of the APEC Senior Officials Meeting on July 30, participants of the forum said that APEC economies have agreed to reaffirm its commitment to working together to build robust food safety systems so as to accelerate progress towards harmonization of food standards with international standards to improve public health and to facilitate trade.
In addressing the challenges facing the food safety system, the FSCF said in a statement that APEC economies will focus the attention on strengthening coordination of food safety capacity building activities, utilizing a broad range of government, industry and academic stakeholders.
The capacity building activities will include strengthening capacity in assessing food safety capacity building needs, food safety risk analysis, developing food laws, standards and enforcement systems, microbiological risk analysis and assessment, food safety risk communication, and chemical safety risk assessment, among others.
Since the FSCF was established in 2007, over 440 people from 19APEC member economies have participated in 24 different capacity building activities held in five cities across the region.
Meanwhile, APEC economies also agreed that they will build on already established networks and processes, particularly to strengthen ability to share information in the event of food safety emergencies.
