Codex – a blueprint for safe food on World Food Safety Day

07/06/2019

7 June 2019 is the first World Food Safety Day and later today at the United Nations in New York Codex Chairperson Guilherme da Costa will reinforce how Codex standards are a blueprint for safe food, highlighting how the international standard setting body - the Codex Alimentarius Commission - contributes to food safety and builds engagement in food safety, to protect consumer health and facilitate trade.

The inaugural World Food Safety Day will call on all those who produce, supply, process, transport, market, regulate or consume to strengthen efforts to ensure that the food we eat is safe.

“For over 50 years Codex has been setting standards and without these standards, there’s no safe food”, said Tom Heilandt, Codex Alimentarius Secretary.

Ensure food is safe

Food safety is everyone's business and to ensure food is safe, food safety authorities can manage food safety risks along the entire food chain, including during emergencies, while countries can comply with international standards established by the Codex Alimentarius Commission. The diverse group that share responsibility for food safety – governments, regional economic bodies, UN organizations, development agencies, trade organizations, consumer and producer groups, academic and research institutions and private sector entities – must work together on issues that affect us all, globally, regionally and locally. Collaboration is needed at many levels – across sectors within a government and across borders when combatting outbreaks of foodborne illness globally, because food safety is a shared responsibility.

Food Safety Facts

An estimated 600 million people – almost 1 in 10 people in the world – fall ill after eating contaminated food and 420 000 die every year.
Children aged under 5 carry 40% of the foodborne disease burden, with 125 000 deaths every year.
Foodborne illnesses are caused by bacteria, viruses, parasites or chemical substances entering the body through contaminated food or water.
Foodborne diseases impede socioeconomic development by straining health care systems and harming national economies, tourism and trade.
The value of trade in food is US$ 1.6 trillion, which is approximately 10% of total annual trade globally.
Recent estimates indicate that the impact of unsafe food costs low- and middle-income economies around US$ 95 billion in lost productivity each year.