New tool aims to relieve the world of contaminated food
The computer program has been developed by a team led by Professor Declan Naughton from Kingston University's School of Life Sciences. It analyses data, such as that produced by the EU's Rapid Alert System for Food and Feed (RASFF). It reveals patterns that identify high-risk transgressor countries and the main destinations detecting them. It could help to inform smarter testing regimes, thus maximising the use of limited resources.
Data taken from notifications for mycotoxin and metal contamination recorded in the RASFF between January 2003 and August 2008 were processed using network analysis to capture the complexity of the issue, analyse the trends and predict possible effects of interventions by identifying patterns of reporting activities between countries. The tool, for example, identified an issue with mercury-contaminated fish from Spain.
Thousands of alerts about contaminated food are generated each year but, according to Naughton, no single international system has been available for monitoring food safety. This prompted Naughton and his colleagues to develop a program to analyse alerts and produce a global picture of the countries that trade and detect contaminated food. Naughton recently presented the results of his team's work to a conference organised by the European Food Safety Authority.
"No other system can reflect the complexity of this information in a snapshot form," claimed Naughton. "It can be particularly helpful to developing countries new to food testing because information is easy to access and available in minutes." However, Naughton said the Food Standards Agency had also expressed interest in the tool to analyse for emerging pests and parasites.
From the analyses, China, Iran, Turkey, the US and Spain were the top five producers of contaminated food. Over the same five-year period, Italy, Germany, the UK, Spain and the Netherlands reported the largest number of contaminated products from other countries.
Naughton added: "We'd like to develop the tool to create an international alert system that will provide real-time information about emerging patterns and problems." He plans to extend the tool to international alert systems beyond RASFF.
To access the free tool visit: http://staffnet.kingston.ac.uk/~ku36087/foodalert.
