Micro-nutrient fortification – Regulatory & Analytical Challenges

In Africa[1], 27 countries have mandates to fortify wheat flour, 10 of the 27 also for maize flour. Six countries in this region fortify more than half of their industrially milled wheat flour, and 2 industrially milled maize meal, even though it is not mandatory. In addition, many countries also fortify cooking oil, sugar, and salt as part of their comprehensive nutrition strategy.

Proving compliance with legislative tools and label declarations will always be difficult using purely analytical tools. Monitoring of fortified foods, however, is proving to be a challenge both technically and administratively with a noticeable lack of trust in the system and, unfortunately, between the stakeholders – this is a global problem and one that is enhanced by a lack of understanding of the nuances in fortification. One approach has been the move towards ‘assisting to comply’ rather than ‘enforcing compliance’, though some regulators see this as a conflict of interest, and one of the objectives of this webinar is to identify areas in which the global expertise of AOAC could be directed, if permitted, within the Region. Another objective is to provide an opportunity for us to share experiences and lessons learnt in the ‘real world of Africa’ and help one another.

[1] https://www.ffinetwork.org/africa

Proposed Programme

• Welcome & Opening (Philip Randall)
• Micro-nutrient deficiency and food fortification in Sub-Saharan Africa (Mduduzi Mbuya, Nutritionist, GAIN)
• The Regulatory Landscape (Cheetham Mingle, Ghana Chief Regulatory Officer)
• Method Uncertainty (Nicole Cotta)
• Analytical techniques & method performance considerations (Dr Anna Zhenchuck, CEO BioAnalyt)
• Panel Discussion and Q&A

PROUDLY SPONSORED BY

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