New food Irradiation Initiative

On October 5, 2021, a meeting convened by Carl Blackburn of the Joint FAO/IAEA Centre of Nuclear Techniques in Food and Agriculture was held to discuss how a small international group could constitute a network could be formed in order to give a new momentum to food irradiation. The participants to this first meeting were Cherin Balt (South Africa), Gao Mei Xu (China), Yves Henon (iia), Florent Kuntz (France), Monique Lacroix (Canada), Suresh Pillai (USA), Peter Roberts (New Zealand), and Alain Strasser (France).

The idea that a new impulse should be given to food irradiation was one of the conclusions of the international symposium on food irradiation organized by Aerial, IBA and Buhler in March 2021.  Peter Roberts gave a presentation on the International Consultative Group on Food Irradiation (ICGFI) who, under the auspices of IAEA, FAO and WHO produced useful work to advance food irradiation but lapsed in 2004 without successor organization. The group had an initial discussion on a few achievable objectives and actions. It was also felt that “young” experts should be invited to join, to bring new ideas and benefit from the expertise of the initial core group.

A second virtual meeting will take place during the second half of November 2021.

 Young professionals interested in this project among our members should contact Ariadnne Vargas Rivadeneira at arivadeneira@iiaglobal.com