The 2nd APEC Food Safety Cooperation Forum Meeting
The APEC Food Safety Cooperation Forum (FSCF) was established on 4 April 2007 and in doing so APEC member economies agreed to work together to build robust food safety systems so as to accelerate progress towards harmonisation of food standards with international standards to improve public health and facilitate trade.
The FSCF met again, for the first time since its establishment, on Thursday 30 July, 2009 in Singapore. The meeting was co-chaired by Australia (Mr Steve McCutcheon, FSANZ) and China (Dr Lin Wei, General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine of the People’s Republic of China (AQSIQ). 96 delegates from 18 member economies attended the meeting and welcomed the progress that has been made since the establishment of the FSCF, to improve information sharing and the coordination of efforts in food safety capacity building.
Since April 2007, when the FSCF was established in the Hunter Valley, Australia, over 550 people from 19 APEC member economies have participated in, or contributed to, FSCF meetings and activities. This included at least 440 participants who have taken part in 24 capacity building activities held in 5 cities across the region. This is the first time that APEC member economies have coordinated their efforts in the area of food safety in this way and are working together to target priority areas of need. This demonstrates real and tangible progress.
Delegates discussed and endorsed the Review of Progress, including the successes and challenges experienced in advancing the FSCF’s goals and objectives, and from that, set key forward directions for the next two year period. The recommendations agreed to for the next two years are as follows:
1.Build on already established communication networks and processes, specifically by:
a.Establishing and maintaining a data base with contact points from each APEC member economy that have specific areas of expertise, for example risk assessment;
b. Sharing information on emerging food safety issues and during food safety emergencies, noting that in doing so, information may be sensitive and appropriate agreements may need to be reached;
c. Strengthening WHO member participation in INFOSAN to increase the ability to respond to food safety emergencies of international significance; and
d. Promoting access to FSCF documents, reports of food safety capacity building activities and, where appropriate, training materials via the FSCF website.
2. Continue to focus on priority food safety capacity building needs, consistent with the results of the national food control systems needs assessment, as identified in the agreed FSCF Capacity Building Priority Areas, with associated activities identified in the FSCF Implementation Plan 2007-2011.
3. Strengthening the coordination and implementation of food safety capacity building activities, utilising a broad range of government, industry and academic stakeholders. We will look to achieve this, particularly through providing strong support to the implementation of the FSCF Partnership Training Institute Network ;
4. Actively consider ways to transfer and measure the successes achieved in the areas of capacity building, to address the FSCF goal of achieving food safety regulatory systems that are consistent with international standards as recommended in the World Trade Organisation SPS/TBT Agreements. An initial step in this direction could potentially be to work towards aligning standards, for example for maximum residue limits with international standards.
In addition, delegates confirmed:
- the revised FSCF Operating Principles
- the revised Food Safety Capacity Building Priorities
- the Implementation Plan 2007-2011
- the Singapore Statement 2009
The progress of the FSCF and the outcomes of the meeting were endorsed by the SCSC and the significant progress that has been made was noted. The SCSC also endorsed the FSCF’s decision to next meet in the margins of SCSC2 in 2011, in the United States.