Codex Alimentarius is a collection of standards, guidelines and codes of practice adopted by the Codex Alimentarius Commission. It is about safe, good food for everyone – everywhere. Their international food standards, guidelines and codes of practice contribute to the safety, quality and fairness of international food trade. International food trade has existed for thousands of years whereby food was mainly produced, sold and consumed locally. Today the amount of food traded internationally has grown exponentially, with varying quantities and varieties of food travelling globally.
Codex was established with the aim of protecting the health of consumers, ensuring fair food trade practices, and promoting coordination of all food standards work undertaken by international governmental and non-governmental organisations.
Hence, consumers can trust the safety and quality of the food products they buy; while importers can trust that the food they ordered will be in accordance with their specifications.
Through Codex a multitude of food standards are developed, whether for processed food, semi-processed food or raw food. In addition, materials used in further processing of food products are included to the extent necessary for achieving the principal objectives of the code protecting the health of consumers and facilitating fair practices in the food trade.
While being recommendations for voluntary application by Codex members, Codex standards serve in many cases as a basis for national legislation. These standards focus on the hygienic and nutritional quality of food; including microbiological norms, food additives, pesticide residues, veterinary drug residues, contaminants, labelling, methods of sampling and analysis, risk analysis, as well as individual standards and advisory Codex of practices.
References made to Codex Food Safety Standards in the World Trade Organization’s (WTO) Agreement on Sanitary and Phytosanitary measures (SPS Agreement) means that Codex has far reaching implications for resolving trade disputes. WTO members that wish to apply stricter food safety measures than those set by Codex may be required to justify these measures scientifically.
Codex Alimentarius is the global reference point for consumers, food producers and processors, national food control agencies and the international food trade. The ‘food code’ (as Codex is known) has an enormous impact on the thinking of food producers and processors as well as on the awareness of the end users – the consumers. Its influence extends to every continent, and its contribution to the protection of public health and fair practices in the food trade is immeasurable.
