About the Almanac

What is the Almanac?

With this online World Food Safety Almanac, the German Federal Institute for Risk Assessment (BfR) hopes to reach many people and to give them insight into the world of global food and feed safety. The Almanac outlines different countries' administrative frameworks in the area of food and feed safety. It also describes the public institutions that carry responsibility within these administrative frameworks. The BfR hopes that the Almanac will serve as a useful tool, informing readers about relevant institutions and helping them to quickly and accurately identify potential collaboration partners for international projects. In this way, the BfR aims to promote the harmonisation of existing methods and processes in food and feed safety and to reduce unintentional duplication of work in this field.

Why is the Almanac necessary?

Our food is so much a part of our daily life that we rarely consider how much of it originates from other countries. The globalisation of food production and trading gives consumers an ever widening variety of options from which to choose. However, globalisation also makes consumer health protection more challenging. As supply chains become increasingly complex, the work of scientific risk assessment, risk management and risk communication is becoming more and more demanding. Today, food and feed safety can only be ensured by taking an international approach, through close collaboration among countries and institutions.

A short journey through the Almanac’s history

Since 2009, the German Federal Institute for Risk Assessment has published the EU Food Safety Almanac in several languages and in both paper and digital forms. In 2017 the 'European Neighbourhood Policy (ENP) Food Safety Almanac' and the ‘Food Safety Almanac – Special edition: Community of Portuguese Language Countries’ were also released. The latest edition of the EU Food Safety Almanac was published in August 2021. The BfR developed the online World Food Safety Almanac in 2021 to be able to update information on the world of food and feed safety more quickly.

The Almanac's maintenance policy

Countries are asked to update their profile as soon as possible in the event of major changes to their public food and feed safety structure and to check their full profile for accuracy once per calendar year. If a profile is not checked for accuracy for two consecutive calendar years, a message box is added to the profile to indicate that the page contents may be out-of-date.

How can I contribute?

If you wish to add your country and/or your food and feed safety institution(s) to the World Food Safety Almanac, please contact the BfR directly to request an account. With your account you will be able to create your country profile, update the page at any time and add translations into different languages. The BfR is the administrator of the World Food Safety Almanac; however, each country, institution and organisation is responsible for the contents of its own profile. We encourage all countries and all public food and feed safety organisations to enter and update their profiles. We hope to expand the World Food Safety Almanac and to make this platform a comprehensive reference tool for the whole world.

Where can I find further information?

Please go to How to read for further instructions.

If you wish to order a printed copy or download the Almanac as a pdf, please click here. To visit the BfR's website, please click here.

EU Food Safety Almanac 2021