Reorganisation of the Directorate-General for Health and Consumer Protection

Citation

Stephen Fallows, D. (2000), "Reorganisation of the Directorate-General for Health and Consumer Protection", Nutrition & Food Science, Vol. 30 No. 6. https://doi.org/10.1108/nfs.2000.01730fag.003

Reorganisation of the Directorate-General for Health and Consumer Protection

Reorganisation of the Directorate-General for Health and Consumer Protection

On 1 July 2000, it was announced that the European Commission Directorate-General (DG) (Ministry) with responsibilities for health and consumer protection had been restructured. The new structure includes seven Directorates as follows:

1. 1.

   General Affairs. This provides a co-ordinating and support role for the DG as a whole.

2. 2.

   Consumer Affairs. This has responsibility for the development of consumer policy in areas other than food.

3. 3.

   Scientific Opinions. This directorate has responsibility for the co-ordination of the work of the several scientific expert committees that provide advice to the Commission. It is suggested that the work of this Directorate will be developed once the proposed Food Safety Authority has been established.

4. 4.

   Food Safety (throughout the production and distribution chain). This focuses on legislation, measures ensuring an informed choice for consumers, and the management of feed and food safety emergencies.

5. 5.

   Food Safety. This will cover issues concerning animal and plant health, including animal welfare and international food safety issues.

6. 6.

   Food and Veterinary Office. The main task is to conduct food safety inspections both within the EU and in other countries wishing to export to the EU.

7. 7.

   Public Health

An announcement giving the above information is available at the followingURL: http://europa.eu.int/comm/dgs/health_consumer/general_info/rcmess.html

One consequence of the changes has been the restructuring of the DG's Web presence. This has been divided along three themes:

1. 1.

   food safety;

2. 2.

   public health; and

3. 3.

   consumer protection.

Access to the food safety section can be achieved via the following URL: http://europa.eu.int/comm/food/index_en.html

This Web page offers links giving access to information on:

1. 1.

   Main subject areas:

2. 2.
   • •

     introduction;

   • •

     animal health;

   • •

     animal welfare;

   • •

     plant health;

   • •

     animal feed safety;

   • •

     safety of food products;

   • •

     food labelling; and

   • •

     international food safety issues.

3. 3.

   Special topics:

4. 4.
   • •

     BSE;

   • •

     biotechnology;

   • •

     precautionary principle; and

   • •

     hormones in meat.

5. 5.

   Documents:

6. 6.
   • •

     scientific committees;

   • •

     inspection reports;

   • •

     regulatory committees;

   • •

     press releases;

   • •

     commission proposals;

   • •

     speeches;

   • •

     legislation in force;

   • •

     reports;

   • •

     events;

   • •

     publications; and

   • •

     surveys.

7. 7.

   What's new?:

8. 8.
   • •

     this lists newly posted/published documents and gives links to information on these.

At the time of writing the Commission's Food Safety Web site is not yet fully operational and has been described by Robert Coleman, the Director-General for Health and Consumer Protection, as a "building site". It is an expectation that each of the items in the above lists will become an active link to further information. Many links are already active – more (if not all) will be so by the time this article is published. The Commission is intending that this site will be a major contributor to the current policy of openness with respect to matters such as food safety.