What is Food Safety?

Food safety is actually the action of monitoring food to make sure that it will not cause foodborne illness or harm to the consumers. Foodborne illness is any illness due to the consumption of contaminated food caused by pathogenic bacteria, viruses, toxins and some others. Food safety prevents the food supply from encountering physical hazards like infestation, chemical hazards such as rancidity, as well as microbial hazards, and even contamination that may occur during all stages of food production and handling, for instance processing, harvesting, transporting and storing. Thus, the goal of food safety monitoring is to keep the food wholesome.
The Department of Food Safety, Zoonoses and Foodborne Diseases (FOS) works with other WHO departments, Regional Offices and WHO collaborating centres as well as other international and national agencies. WHO also works closely with the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) to address food safety issues along the entire food production chain, from production to consumption.