A vision for allergen management best practice in the food industry

Allergenic foods have become recognised as a food safety hazard over the last two decades. Over the same period, knowledge about the biology and clinical characteristics of food allergy has grown, together with information that can be used to assess the risk more accurately. While current practices in allergen management have increased the safety of food products to allergic consumers, the standards applied by different manufacturers remain divergent in the absence of agreed approaches to risk assessment. This has been reflected in a considerable expansion of precautionary labelling and a concomitant reduction in consumers’ trust, resulting in risk-taking. To address these issues, this paper advocates a risk management approach based on a common agreed set of principles, leading to consistent and well-understood management action levels across the food industry. The approach also recognises that minimising the risk from allergenic foods is a shared responsibility of all the stakeholders involved. Action levels, by permitting a consistent use of precautionary labelling and clear communication of the allergen status of a food, will play a crucial role in ensuring that risks from allergenic foods are reduced as far as possible.