1st GHI World Congress on Food Safety and Security

It is with great pleasure that the Global Harmonization Initiative (GHI) invites you to attend the 1st GHI World Congress on Food Safety and Security, 24-28 March 2019, in Leiden, The Netherlands. Our aim is to bring together leading scientists, researchers and research scholars from academia and industry, prominent decision makers from international organisations, and the public from across the globe to advance the conversation about the vital role of modern science in food legislation and regulation.

One of the major problems in food safety and security regulation is that many existing laws, rules and guidelines are originated from decades-old data and methods, several of which are not even relevant to human exposure. More than five decades of research has shown convincingly that food safety and security regulations should be changed and revised on the basis of updated and validated assays. Our rationale for organising the 1st GHI World Congress is to generate a platform to present and implement the most suitable assays for food safety and security assessment within different fields—from chemistry and microbiology, to genetic toxicology and genomics—throughout entire processes, from farm to fork.

These issues and more are the focus of the 1st GHI’s World Congress, which seeks to help declare and establish new directions in the work of ensuring food safety and security throughout supply chains and throughout the world. The outcomes from this meeting can pave the way toward more accurate detection of human risk to dietary components and thus, improve human health status. Our intention is to produce a declaration that is agreed by all participants which calls for and establishes a target to change regulations within a specified time based on available knowledge.

It is time to change, and we do have the potential (and the scientific knowledge and tools) to make changes that enhance our ability to improve food safety and security goals. On behalf of the GHI membership and organising committee, I do hope that you will join us in March 2019 for this unique and transformative scientific programme.

Dr. h.c. Huub Lelieveld, President, Global Harmonization Initiative

Dr. Firouz Darroudi, Chair Scientific Committee, Global Harmonization Initiative