Trinidad and Tobago celebrates First World Food Safety Day

The first-ever World Food Safety Day, adopted by the United Nations General Assembly in December 2018, was celebrated on 7 June 2019 under the theme “Food Safety, everyone’s business”. WHO, in collaboration with the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) is pleased to facilitate Member States effort to celebrate the World Food Safety Day this year and in coming years.

The UN, The National Food Safety Committee,The Ministry of Agriculture and the Faculty of Agriculture, University of the West Indies, held a display and public forum to raise awareness about food safety.

Access to sufficient amounts of safe and nutritious food is key to sustaining life and promoting good health.  Foodborne diseases impede socioeconomic development by straining health care systems and harming national economies, tourism and trade.  With an estimated 600 million cases of foodborne diseases annually – almost 1 in 10 people in the world fall ill after eating contaminated – food safety is an increasing threat to human health.  Children under 5 years of age carry 40% of the foodborne disease burden with 125 000 deaths every year.

Food safety is key to achieving several UN Sustainable Development Goals and is a shared responsibility between governments, producers and consumers.  Everybody has a role to play from farm to table to ensure the food we consume is safe and will not cause damages to our health.  Through the World Food Safety Day, WHO pursues its efforts to mainstream food safety in the public agenda and reduce the burden of foodborne diseases globally.