April 2008

Reducing people’s intake of salt has been one of the Agency’s main campaigns in recent years and as 75% of the salt we eat is already in the food that we buy, the Agency has also been working with the food industry to reduce the levels of salt in foods like bacon, ham, cheese, bread, breakfast cereals and ready meals –­ with some considerable reductions having already been achieved.

Unfortunately, we haven’t had a breakthrough on every product. The salt and health campaigning group CASH (Consensus Action on Salt and Health) have been looking at Delia Smith’s most recent book and TV series – 'How to Cheat at Cooking' – which encourages people to cook meals using ready prepared foods, rather than cooking from scratch.  This is, in theory, a really useful concept because it helps us to make tasty meals more quickly, something which is increasingly important in a world where we are all becoming busier and so have less time to cook.

It was interesting to read Amanda Ursell's piece in the Times recently (‘Let's Hear it for the Bad Guys’) which was a slightly unorthodox approach to get us to rethink how we look at certain foods including ice cream, white bread and kebabs.

Of course, the central point is that we would all benefit from enjoying a balanced and varied diet with everything in moderation. The fact that Amanda can write a whole column telling us it is okay to actually eat meat and butter shows how easy it is to forget this.

It may have passed you by, but in among the nation’s April fools last week came the biggest shake-up in the British statistical system in half a century. The distinctly non-foolish UK Statistics Authority (UKSA) came into existence on 1 April – an independent body, with powers and the obligation to promote, improve, and safeguard official statistics across the UK. UKSA will follow a model close to that of the Food Standards Agency, being run by a multidisciplinary board, independent of Government Ministers.

Getting young people into science is a constant refrain in the media, yet retaining people who have chosen scientific careers is no less important. So I was really pleased to launch a pilot for a Continuing Professional Development (CPD) scheme for scientists in the Agency.  I encourage all scientists in the Agency to develop their scientific skills and expertise I believe this is a good opportunity for them as well as the organisation.

I am looking forward to working with the Institute of Food Science & Technology, which is going to run the pilot.  IFST are the professional body representing food scientists and bring experience of working on CPD schemes with other organisations.  The pilot will run for a year until April 2009 and then we hope to make this available to all scientists in the Agency. 

Reading the papers over the last week you couldn’t help but notice that the Italian buffalo mozzarella industry is having a hard time at the moment. High dioxin levels in some buffalo mozzarella from the Campania region of Italy near Naples have led some countries to announce restrictions on the import of this specialty food.