Safer Food, Better Health: Making Food Safety Ambassadors

For World Food Safety Day, the Food Safety Ambassadors’ Network (FOSAN) organized the 8th Regional Food Science and Technology Summit at the Nigerian Institute of Food Science and Technology, the University of Ibadan. FOSAN coordinator, Professor Folake O. Henshaw was the event speaker.

The audience was made up of stakeholders in the food and agricultural industry, food scientists, food manufacturers and other stakeholders in the food chain. Henshaw gave some background to how World Food Safety Day was established by the United Nations. This the 4th anniversary of World Food Safety Day and, according to Henshaw, the impact of the campaigns on making food safer from farm to fork, is beginning to spread as more groups are coming on board to raise awareness by organizing different activities to mark the day.

This upbeat tempo needs to be sustained, she said. The call was to inspire more people to team up for food safety by becoming a food safety ambassador. The mission of the Food Safety Ambassadors Network is the dissemination of science-based food safety knowledge to stakeholders in order to achieve enhanced awareness and increased adoption of food safety practices from farm to fork.

Food safety education should be in formats and modes that are suited to targeted sectors of the food chain. The highlight of the session was the distribution of posters of WHO’s 5 Keys to Safer Foods, translated into Yoruba, one of the local languages in Nigeria. This will act as a tool to educate the informal food sector of the food chain and bridge the knowledge gap, thereby enhancing safer food handling practices.