Workshop on Risk Ranking of Hazards in Foods

On October 19-20 a workshop will be held in Uppsala, Sweden, to discuss the state-of-the-art in risk ranking of hazards in food. The event is organised by the Swedish Food Agency and the Finnish Food Authority,  supported by the European Food Safety Authority.

On-site participation

Registration for on-site participation is closed.

Online participation (first day only)

Registration for online participation is closed.

Scope and target groups

The workshop is directed towards professionals within the sectors of risk analysis - primarily risk assessment, but also risk management and risk communication. By risk ranking we mean 1) ranking of chemical and/or microbiological hazard with respect to single or multiple foods/food groups, or 2) ranking of foods/food groups with respect to single or multiple hazards.

While the specific topic is risk ranking the workshop is also relevant for risk-benefit assessments since the use of comparative metrics is an important element in both areas. More generally, the workshop relates to the consideration and integration of data from multiple domains and sources relevant to the risk context.

During the first day of the workshop an introduction and overview of the risk ranking area will be provided followed by presentations on specific approaches/tools and related methods for chemicals, and both chemical and microbiological hazards. The latter part of the day will then cover a broader context, including decision-making and risk communication. The second day of the workshop is devoted to discussions of key topics in groups. Each group will discuss one of the topics below:

  • Purpose and value of risk ranking
    Risk ranking is proposed as an activity that can support risk managers in prioritizing the use of available (finite and often limited) resources, as well as assisting risk communication. This topic includes discussing how risk-ranking is practiced, and the potential benefits and barriers for a systematic use in the area of food safety.
  • A common approach
    Is a comparative risk assessment/ranking framework across all types of hazards that involves the use of common risk metrics a desirable goal? This topic includes discussing useful metrics, how general a risk ranking framework should be, and if there are advantages of separately comparing different “apples” and different “oranges”.
  • Challenges and future developments
    What are the scientific challenges related to risk ranking? This topic includes discussing and identifying these challenges, and how we envision future developments in the area, separating issues specifically associated with risk ranking from those applying to risk assessment more generally.

Programme

 

Contact information: riskranking@slv.se

Senast granskad 2022-04-08