The students of the Master in Innovation in Food Science and Technology “Michele Ferrero” attended FAO for a full program of meetings and lessons.
Accompanied by Professor Antonio Gallo – director of the course held at the Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, Cremona campus – they were able to delve into the topic of food labelling, taught by Maria Xipsiti, Nutrition Officer of the Food and Nutrition Division. The lesson highlighted the key role of labels in ensuring food safety, promoting healthy diets, and preventing fraud. Labelling is recognized as an important tool for consumers, providing information on ingredients, nutritional values, and food quality.
FAO, together with WHO, works to develop international standards through the Codex Alimentarius, which sets guidelines for food safety and quality worldwide. One of the fundamental aspects is nutrition labelling, which helps combat diet-related non-communicable diseases. This includes nutrient declarations, reference values, ingredient declarations, and nutrition and health claims.
Another key area is food date marking, with labels indicating "best before" and "use by" dates to help prevent waste and ensure product safety. Educating consumers and industry stakeholders is essential for correctly interpreting these labels.
Science, innovation, and new technologies to accelerate change
The role of innovation and technology in transforming agrifood systems to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals by 2030 is the theme that Selvaraju Ramasamy explores.
Since current systems are inefficient, FAO focuses on science, innovation, and new technologies to accelerate change. FAO’s strategic approach is based on three key principles: selecting the right innovation, generating the right impact, and applying it in the right context. The 2022-2031 framework includes four accelerators: anticipating and planning, connecting and empowering, fostering an innovation culture and mindset, and catalyzing and scaling solutions.
The innovations considered include digital tools for traceability, renewable energy, biotechnology, sustainable agriculture, and new institutional and financial models. FAO follows a structured innovation pathway that involves foresight and future analysis, solution incubation, experimentation, and removing barriers to facilitate global scaling.
The Codex Alimentarius
A simulation of the Codex Alimentarius, a set of food safety norms and standards developed to ensure consumer health and fair trade in food products, concluded the visit to FAO by the students of the Ferrero Master, who had a great experience deepening their knowledge and interacting with experts in the sector.