Essay on Food Regulatory Affairs

The Rapid Alert System for Food and Feed, abbreviated as RASFF, is an effective tool put in place for food and feed authorities in Europe. It is meant to provide these authorities with a means of exchanging information about the measures taken to respond to dire risks with respect to foodstuffs. This swapping of information assists member states respond to health threats posed by food or feed in a more rapid and co-ordinated manner. RASFF members include the European Union member states, Norway, Liechtenstein, Iceland, the European Food Safety, the Commission, and the Authority. All of them have a 24/7 service meant to make sure that urgent notification are sent, gotten on the other end, and then responded to as quickly as possible. RASFF has made it possible for numerous food safety risks to be averted before they can cause any harm to consumers.

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How the RASFF functions is quite simple. If a member state accesses information to do with the existence risk to human health posed by foodstuff, the information is immediately passed on to the Commission. In case EFTA states are involved, the information is passed on to the authority. The Commission then passes this piece of information to all member states. On a daily basis, the European Commission gets information from national authorities concerning any dangerous food products found as well as the measures taken to mitigate them. The origin of such information may be from distributors or producers who willingly recall products that have been found to pose a risk to consumers health. A list is then made of these products that describe the risk they pose and what can be done about it, which is then published on the internet. Other member states may find similar products in their markets; something that compels them to include additional information and measures than can deter further sales. The entire information is circulated within the network.

Europe relies more than ever on RASFF to make sure that foodstuff in the continent satisfies the worlds highest food safety standards. In addition to its main role as enforcing food safety, it is also an important tool for tracing fraudulent products and withdrawing them from the market. For instance, in 2013, it transmitted a total of 3025 notifications. 596 of those were classified as alerts, 705 information for attention, 1496 border rejection notifications, and 442 information for follow-ups. They triggered 5158 follow-up notifications, signifying an average of about 1.6 follow-ups per initial notification. Several actions can result from follow-up notifications, such as withdrawal, recall, seizure and eventual destruction of marked food products. There was a 9% decrease in the total number of notifications sent via RASFF. Notable issues included food-borne outbreaks resulting from Hepatitis A virus present in strawberries and berry mixes. Also, adverse reaction were reported as having been caused by food supplements containing rather dangerous ingredients such as shigatoxin-secreting E.Coli in meat products together with pesticide residue on plant foods.

With regards to plans for the future, indications point to a rising need for exchange of information on cross-border food fraud cases that are becoming quite sophisticated. The Commission was inspired by RASFF to develop a food fraud IT system. This system will reinforce the role played by EU Food Fraud Network. It will offer a platform whereby there will be cross-border administrative co-operation among national authorities. This will facilitate swift exchange of information concerning fraudulent and deceptive activities within the food industry and ways of pursuing them.

References Bouzembrak, Y. and Marvin, H.J., 2016. Prediction of food fraud type using data from Rapid Alert System for Food and Feed (RASFF) and Bayesian network modelling. Food Control, 61, pp.180-187.

Leuschner, R.G., Hristova, A., Robinson, T. and Hugas, M., 2013. The rapid alert system for food and feed (RASFF) database in support of risk analysis of biogenic amines in food. Journal of food composition and analysis, 29(1), pp.37-42.