May 2007

I was delighted that the FSA Board recognised the strength of the Agency's science base when I delivered my first annual report as Chief Scientist to them earlier this month, something I blogged about at the time.

But I don't want to be complacent, so I've committed to strengthening our position further over the coming year.

One way in which we will achieve this is through the establishment of a new scientific advisory committee – the General Advisory Committee on Science (GACS).

We’ve been thinking a lot recently about how to handle and prevent food incidents. This is when we’re given information that requires us to intervene because the safety or quality of food could be threatened in some way.

Last year we dealt with 1300 incidents. More recent ones we’ve handled include a recall of cakes and biscuits because they may contain bits of plastic, and a fish product sold in a small number of specialist shops with a label that said ‘keep in a cool dry place’ when it should have been frozen.

Last month I wrote about the Agency's ongoing role in monitoring the after-affects of the Chernobyl power station accident in 1986. This week the announcement of consultation into the possibility of building new nuclear power plants in the UK reminds me that the Agency plays a role here, too.

Before any new plant is built, the impact of its potential planned discharges to the environment must be assessed. The nuclear regulators, the Environment Agency, for England and Wales, and the Scottish Environment Protection Agency north of the Border, therefore consult the Agency on the likely effects on foods close to the power station, and on the consumers that might eat them.

It’s been a busy week and this is my first full day back in the office. I’ve spent an away day working on leadership behaviours with my heads of division and team leaders, then a day at the Federation of Bakers annual conference, where the Agency’s Chair Deirdre Hutton praised the Federation for their work on salt reduction. And of course then there was yesterday’s FSA Board Meeting in Nottingham.

There has been a buzz of anticipation all week about the Board discussion on whether to recommend to ministers the mandatory fortification of flour with folic acid. Of course, this was of considerable interest to the bakers and millers at the FoB conference. Coming just a day before the debate, I could not predict what the Board would recommend, but I was able to talk about the process by which this issue was addressed. And in many ways I think the folate issue is an exemplar of how the Agency works.

I’m not surprised that our Board paper on folic acid, published last Friday in advance of this week’s meeting, got lots of weekend media coverage.

Nor is it surprising that the pregnancy and baby sections on our eatwell website are always in the top ten of most-visited pages.

In April 1986 I was on a walking trip in Wales when news came through about the Chernobyl nuclear accident. There was a heavy shower and I wondered then how widespread the potential for exposure to radiation might be.   

Large quantities of radioactivity were released into the atmosphere and were carried across Europe. Some of this radioactivity was deposited, during rainfall, over parts of Northern Ireland, and the high ground of Wales, North West England and Scotland.  

You may have seen the media coverage today on additives and the study that the Agency has commissioned. The study looks at the effects certain artificial food colours and a preservative may or may not have on the behaviour of children. The research was carried out on behalf of the FSA by the University of Southampton.

The FSA carries out and commissions extensive scientific research and survey work to ensure that our advice to the public is based on the best and most up-to-date food science. We are advised in our work by independent scientific experts.

The Agency is currently working with the scientists who carried out this research to ensure the findings go through a rigorous peer review process and are published in a scientific journal. Peer review is the process of submitting scientific findings for review by other experts in the field, via publication in a scientific journal. The peer review process is the standard mechanism for ensuring the validity of the science. Interestingly, the Royal Society started the first peer reviewed scientific journal in 1665, 'Philosophical Transactions' - this journal is still produced today, although there are now many others besides!

Had a great meeting just outside Nottingham last week with around 80 local food business representatives, and was joined by Rob Howard, the Agency's regional co-ordinator for the East Midlands. I talked about science quite a bit, but the audience were also interested in our role as a regulator, our work on salt and front-of-pack labelling and our handling of food incidents.

We're actually doing some workshops with local businesses on incident prevention at the moment, so I updated the audience on that. It's good to get out and about and talk about science in the context of our work as a regulator. There was a good discussion of the issues after I'd finished speaking, which included how we communicate with the media. I'd been keen to do more events of this kind around the country as I find it really valuable.

My first ever foray into blogging in November last year was about food fraud, and I'm talking about it again today, living proof that what comes around goes around, I suppose. There's been lots of media interest over the last few weeks in our authenticity survey into farmed and wild fish.

That doesn't surprise me. Lots of consumers are interested in this issue.  A colleague was in Sainsbury's the other day and heard a woman at the fish counter seeking assurances that salmon described as 'wild' had not been farmed.