Food Allergy Forum Report and New Youtube Channel

On 1st-3rd April 2019 the 2nd Food Allergy Forum was held in Amsterdam. The conference hosted speakers coming from Europe, North-America and Australia and offered a mixed approach to the topic: regulatory, clinical and scientific.

It was the perfect occasion to launch our new YouTube Channel and start with Bert Popping and FOCOS our new editorial project: 100” Food News.  Huge thanks to Bert and Carmen Diaz Amigo for the stunning graphics. Subscribe our YouTube channels and stay tuned for more news!

During the first day the most discussed issue was the opportunity to finally define thresholds for the use of precautionary allergen statements on the labels. Some regulators were pretty shy on the topic, explaining how we do not have conclusive data for all the food allergens and for all subjects’ categories. Very true, as well as the fact that the industry is taking responsibility every day in managing such situations and deciding how to protect consumers: after 20 years of discussions I think it’s time for the regulators to step in, Codex Alimentarius included. Maybe we would not have the best thresholds/action levels possible, but at least we will have something to work on and an instrument to standardized the approach. Today many countries are defining their own thresholds through soft law and non-binding guidance, and the outputs might differ greatly.

Would we really think that a jungle of different numbers would help the industry to adopt a more rationale approach to the precautionary allergen labeling? And what about consumers understanding of such indications?

This and much more in the first 100” Food News and in Bert’s full report about the conference.