Separately, Steve Wearne of the UK Food Standards Agency and the Codex Alimentarius Commission was sanguine about the Global Markets Programme transition and how it gives “the focus for our further, future collaboration between GFSI and Codex.”

Both the GFSI Capacity Building Framework and just-announced Global Markets Programme will play big parts, according to panellist Kelley Cormier of USAID, Erica Sheward of GFSI, Mars Inc.’s Mick McDonald and Cliona Murphy of PepsiCo. The work will form part of the GFSI-USAID partnership announced during the conference. Relatedly, a morning breakout gave stakeholders a look at the future, where digital tools employed will help companies along the value chain improve food safety through a new pathway to certification. “Africa has an enormous potential for economic growth, and this is growth that can really lift people out of poverty and help lessen chronic food insecurity and malnutrition,” said Keith Dokho, private sector engagement secretariat lead for USAID. The MoU builds upon seven years of collaboration and states that USAID will support GFSI in developing its capability-building framework for less-developed food business operators worldwide - especially in Africa. The public-private theme was further highlighted by the new memorandum of understanding between GFSI and USAID announced yesterday. We need to work together,” said Ken Petersen, associate deputy administrator of the USDA Agricultural Marketing Service, during today’s breakout on the topic.

“At the end of the day, we’re all striving for safety. Their presentations highlighted GFSI’s unique opportunity to serve as a bridge between the public and private sectors such as through the acknowledgment of publically owned and operated standards. Under the theme “ Delivering Safe Food in Turbulent Times: The Need for Agility & Resilience”, the third day further drilled down into creating greater links between stakeholders such as policy makers, academics and food safety leaders from national, regional and international regulatory bodies.

Icons can be consensus tools and provide a common language that “give people a greater understanding of why certifications matter, why trust matters.”

Keynote speaker Douglas Gayeton, co-founder and chief investigator of The Lexicon, shared his work on Foodicons, an open-source package of icons that help explain key terms and principles that define global food systems. Top food industry leaders, technology experts, and policy makers took to the stage at the 22nd annual GFSI Conference to take a deep dive into breakthrough approaches to build out food safety capability all along the supply chain.

Event Horizon by Steven E. McDonald