Historical and Emerging Trends for Residues and Contaminants in Products of Animal Origin

The European Union (EU) has one of the highest levels of food safety standards in the world, largely due to the extensive body of legislation in place, which ensures that food is safe. The rules apply from farm to fork, whether food is produced in the EU or imported from elsewhere in the world.

One key tool used to react rapidly to food and feed safety crises and incidents is the Rapid Alert System for Food and Feed (RASFF) which enables information to be shared rapidly and efficiently between food control authorities in Member States and the European Commission when a risk to health has been identified. In this way, countries can act rapidly and in a coordinated manner to avert food safety risks before they can harm consumers including the management of costly product recalls.

What will I learn?

In this webinar, you will learn about how RASFF operates as applied to residues and contaminants in food of animal origin, some historical trends (veterinary drug residues), and emerging threats (PFAS).

We will also delve into the analytical methods suitable for determination of key chemical hazards, for checking compliance with EU regulations, which will avoid RASFF notifications, both prior to export but also for official control within the EU (and elsewhere).

Presenter: Simon HIRD, Ph.D, MRSC, CChem. (Strategic Analyst, Testing and Laboratory Services, Waters Corporation)

Simon Hird has worked for Waters since 2014 as a Principal Scientist, in the Food and Environmental Market area and now as a Strategic Analyst in Waters’ new Testing and Laboratory Service business unit. Simon contributes to scientific projects, is involved in the commercialisation of new technologies, and provides advice, training, and context to various parts of the Waters organisation and to customers globally. Simon instructs on internationally recognised training courses, such as SARAF, GFoRSS and for AOAC India section. Simon continues to be invited to present at international conferences and has 24 peer-reviewed publications, including one of the most downloaded Trends in Analytical Chemistry articles, “Liquid chromatography-mass spectrometry for the determination of chemical contaminants in food”. Prior to joining Waters, Simon spent almost 20 years at a government laboratory in the UK (now called Fera Science), where he had various roles associated with residues testing and food authenticity before leading an LC-MS/MS team responsible for determination of residues and contaminants in food and environmental samples.

Moderator: Moderator - Joanne Ho, Ph.D. (Food and Environmental, APAC Market Development Manager, Waters Corporation)

Joanne Ho is the Food and Environmental Market Development at Waters Corporation. She received her PhD in Chemistry from the University of New South Wales, Australia. During her career, Joanne has developed applications using LC and LC-MS techniques for a variety of applications ranging from active ingredients like organic acids to food contaminant residues like mycotoxins. Joanne is part of the Asia Pacific team and works with customers in the region to understand their analytical challenges and helps address them with Waters solutions.