Pilot symposium addresses terrorism threat to food supply
Organized by the FBI and Interpol, 110 representatives from law enforcement and regulatory agencies from 25 member countries attended the event earlier this month.
One of the objectives was to assist member countries in developing threat based strategies on preventing and responding to potential chemical and biological attacks against the global food system through intentional contamination.
The pilot event was the first time law enforcement have come together to hear about the risks and challenges of investigating deliberate contamination of food with chemicals or biological materials.
Industry role highlighted
Rebecca Hoile, Interpol’s bioterrorism prevention unit coordinator, said industry plays an important part in prevention of such crimes, as the food chain system relies on quality control measures along the supply chain and within the manufacturing process.
“It was an exciting event with the main objectives to bring a cross section of specialists together who would be involved in an investigation of deliberate contamination on the food supply, present the current threats and risks and call for national points of contact (POC) for future engagement in this area,” she told FoodQualityNews.
“Some member countries do have a system of detection and response in place and Interpol’s role will be to share their best practice techniques and assist others to establish procedures and networks which can provide a basis for countering this threat.
Interpol survey
- The link in the chain judged the most vulnerable was processing/manufacture, based on the survey results, with 69% voting for this option and only 1% each for farm-raw product and packaging.
- A total of 25% of 76 respondents said they had investigated more than five deliberate food contamination incidents in the past three years.
“The symposium provided case examples, best practice techniques and showcased the latest research and data analysis related to the food industry and the issues of food contamination. The symposium, also highlighted (through a live questionnaire) the current status, opinion and ideas across a set of key questions.”
Attendees included Vertic, WHO, French Prosecutors Office, Dairy New Zealand, the CDC, FDA and USDA, Food Protection and Defense Institute and Middle East Technical University.
Scott Spence, programme director for national implementation at Vertic, gave a presentation on establishing laws and regulations to protect the food supply from contamination with biological agents or highly toxic chemicals.
Food defence as a concern
David Beall, FBI WMD directorate unit chief, said a lot of law enforcement and public health agencies who review threats have not necessarily viewed food defence as a particular concern.
“In today’s world, especially with terrorism, the insider threat is one of the biggest concerns. We want this group of esteemed professionals to start asking 'Who is working in these facilities that have access to food?' That's important to know. Our goal is to leave here committed to communicating about food defence concerns."
Pierre St Hilaire, Interpol’s director of counter terrorism, said: “In the current climate of countering terrorism we must not rule out the risk to the food chain and the capabilities of terrorist groups to commit such a crime.”
Hoile said food defence is the protection of food from the deliberate contamination or alteration that is intended to cause harm.
“That describes events that have happened and continue to happen around the globe, albeit not frequently yet the current analysis suggests that this form of attack is real and likely to occur.
“The food distribution system is complex and global and therefore an incident of deliberate contamination of a common food source will quickly become an international concern and even emergency.”
There is a lot of work being done in the area but it is not all being shared, said Holie.
“While there are a number of institutes and universities working on aspects of food defence and undertaking research into some of the countermeasures (data collection, analysis, ability to trace food product to the source, forensic evidence recovery from food etc) it is not at this stage being shared across the agencies involved in its investigation and we hope to in the near future create working groups to share the outcomes of this research nationally and globally.
“Law enforcement should establish outreach with local and national industry’s to provide an understanding of roles and responsibilities during an investigation and by establishing these relationships the ability to communicate between each other will be crucial should a trigger or indicator of a deliberate attack be identified.“
