Food safety is the assurance that food will not cause harm to the consumer when it is prepared and/or eaten according to its intended use.

Food hygiene is all conditions and measures necessary to ensure the safety and suitability of food at all stages of the food chain.

Millions of people fall ill and many of these suffer from serious disorders, long-term complications, or die as a result of eating unsafe food. Foodborne and waterborne diarrhoea diseases, for example, are leading causes of illness and globally kill an estimated 2.1 million people annually, most of whom are children in developing countries. In addition, foodborne chemical hazards still cause significant public health problems, even though the disease burden of these chemicals is difficult to estimate. This situation is a reality that health authorities and consumers must face despite the right of consumers to adequate, safe and suitable food to meet their nutritional needs being recognized more than a decade ago by the 1992 FAO/WHO International Conference on Nutrition.

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