Infosan Activity Report 2020 2021

INFOSAN has been connecting national authorities worldwide since 2004. Its goal has been to prevent the international spread of contaminated food and foodborne disease and strengthen food safety systems globally. This has been done by 1. promoting the rapid exchange of information during food safety events; 2. sharing information on important food safety issues of global interest; 3. promoting partnership and collaboration between countries and networks; and 4. helping countries to strengthen their capacity to manage food safety emergencies. Since its inception, the INFOSAN Secretariat has facilitated international communications between members during hundreds of food safety events; including 162 during the 2018/2019 biennium, double the number of events dealt with in the previous biennium. This INFOSAN Activity Report provides an overview of the major events, activities and information products relating to INFOSAN in 2018/2019. The report highlights some achievements from the biennium, as well as challenges to overcome and areas for improvement. INFOSAN aims to be a member-driven network and thus a united and sustained effort must be made by all INFOSAN members for the network to reach its full potential.

This Open Access book compiles the findings of the Scientific Group of the United Nations Food Systems Summit 2021 and its research partners. The Scientific Group was an independent group of 28 food systems scientists from all over the world with a mandate from the Deputy Secretary-General of the United Nations. The chapters provide science- and research-based, state-of-the-art, solution-oriented knowledge and evidence to inform the transformation of contemporary food systems in order to achieve more sustainable, equitable and resilient systems.

This book aims to contribute the knowledge and understanding of nutritional impact of food systems. Focus is also be given to food systems elements status identification, policy analysis to examine potential effects of different policy options throughout the food system, in particular policies in agriculture, food marketing and trade, social protection, gender, Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) on food industry, nutrition, and environment and education etc. Good practice and lessons learnt to strengthen the beneficiary countries’ evidence-base for addressing nutrition related challenges from the food system perspective.

The new WHO Global Strategy for Food Safety 2022-2030 was adopted by the Seventy-fifth World Health Assembly in 2022. The updated strategy addresses current and emerging challenges, incorporates new technologies and includes innovative approaches for strengthening food safety systems. The target audience includes policy-makers (national and subnational governments), technical authorities/agencies responsible for food safety, academia, food business operators (FBOs) and private sectors, consumers, civil societies, UN agencies and WHO staff. This new document was prepared with support from the Technical Advisory Group (TAG) on Food Safety: Safer food for better health. It reflects feedback received through consultation process with Member States and governmental institutions, United Nations agencies and other intergovernmental organizations, academia, NGOs, private sector entities, and individuals working in public health and food safety. The vision of the draft strategy is to ensure that all people, everywhere, consume safe and healthy food to reduce the burden of foodborne diseases. With five interlinked and mutually supportive strategic priorities, the draft strategy aims to build forward-looking, evidence-based, people-centred, and cost-effective food safety systems with coordinated governance and adequate infrastructures. This strategy contributes to the achievement of the SDGs and will be reviewed in 2030 when the world will reflect upon the progress made towards the SDGs.

Foodborne diseases takes a major toll on health. Thousands of millions of people fall ill and many die as a result of eating unsafe food. Deeply concerned by this a resolution was adopted by WHO and its Member States to recognize fod safety as an essential public health function and to develop a Global Strategy for reducing the burden of foodborne diseases.

The 2018 FAO-OIE-WHO (Tripartite) zoonoses guide, “Taking A Multisectoral, One Health Approach: A Tripartite Guide to Addressing Zoonotic Diseases in Countries” (2018 TZG) is being jointly developed to provide member countries with practical guidance on OH approaches to build national mechanisms for multisectoral coordination, communication, and collaboration to address zoonotic disease threats at the animal-human-environment interface. The 2018 TZG updates and expands on the guidance in the one previous jointly-developed, zoonoses-specific guidance document: the 2008 Tripartite “Zoonotic Diseases: A Guide to Establishing Collaboration between Animal and Human Health Sectors at the Country Level”, developed in WHO South-East Asia Region and Western Pacific Region. The 2018 TZG supports building by countries of the resilience and capacity to address emerging and endemic zoonotic diseases such as avian influenza, rabies, Ebola, and Rift Valley fever, as well as food-borne diseases and antimicrobial resistance, and to minimize their impacts on health, livelihoods, and economies. It additionally supports country efforts to implement WHO International Health Regulations (2005) and OIE international standards, to address gaps identified through external and internal health system evaluations, and to achieve targets of the Sustainable Development Goals. The 2018 TZG provides relevant country ministries and agencies with lessons learned and good practices identified from country-level experiences in taking OH approaches for preparedness, prevention, detection and response to zoonotic disease threats, and provides guidance on multisectoral communication, coordination, and collaboration. It informs on regional and country-level OH activities and relevant unisectoral and multisectoral tools available for countries to use.