The International Portal for Food Safety, Animal and Plant Health

The changing patterns of food and agricultural production, greater attention to the environmental impact of agriculture, emergence of new technologies and potential contaminants, increase in international trade, and a heightened consumer awareness of food safety and animal health issues have all combined to increase interest in global sanitary and phytosanitary measures. This interest comes from international agencies; national trade, agriculture, food safety, environment and consumer protect ion services; international trading partners; and private sector organizations. Each requires reliable information on standards, regulations, scientific evaluations, and other supporting information whether to make decisions on trade-related issues or to prepare relevant regulations or measures. Despite the broad level of interest, obtaining accurate and current information can be difficult. There are two common problems: 1) information may be difficult to locate, and 2) it may not always be clear which source represents the current official position on a given subject. A user may need to search the websites of a number of different international standard setting bodies to retrieve all the relevant information on a particular commodity or on a specific topic. The same scenario is repeated at the national level where standards, regulations, and related information may be spread across the websites of several agencies. Further, some valuable information may not currently be electronic ally available to the general public.