The World Health Organisation (WHO) is creating an Alliance for Food Safety to help countries with surveillance of foodborne diseases.
As reported in Food Safety News, the first meeting of the WHO Alliance for Food Safety is occurring this May.
The WHO Global Strategy for Food Safety 2022 to 2030 was adopted at the World Health Assembly in May 2022. Countries committed to advancing food safety through five priorities and adopted targets to guide action and track progress toward reducing foodborne infections.
For one of the indicators — Multisectoral collaboration mechanism for food safety events — the International Food Safety Authorities Network (INFOSAN) will be the platform to build capacity and ensure reporting. INFOSAN was created in 2004 and has more than 800 members in 187 nations.
However, for the indicator called ‘Surveillance of foodborne diseases and contamination’ there is no similar structure to align efforts and support countries. This indicator uses the International Health Regulations Joint External Evaluation tool. As of 2022, the score stood at 1.5 and the aim by 2030 is a global average capacity score of 3.5.