Food sampling is the main surveillance mechanism for assessing the safety and authenticity of foods placed on the market.
Food sampling carried out by local authorities provides the principal surveillance mechanism for assessing the safety and authenticity of foods placed on the market. This generates valuable evidence to support risk assessment and the targeting of further surveillance and enforcement activities.
There are several food sampling programmes:
In addition to routine sampling activities carried out by local authorities, we also fund them to carry out additional food sampling through a targeted surveillance programme. To ensure that food products available to consumers in Scotland are safe and authentic, we provide funding to address key and emerging food safety issues identified through its food surveillance activities.
Priorities for the yearly sampling programme are informed by intelligence and trends gathered from the Scottish Food Sampling Database (SFSD), horizon scanning activities undertaken by us, and issues identified by local authority food liaison groups and through liaison with others (including the Food Standards Agency).
Continuing support for these additional risk-based, intelligence-led sampling activities ensures we continue to address recommendations made in the Scudamore Expert Advisory Group Report (2013).
FSS fund a programme of surveys, driving insights into the risk profile of products available in Scotland. These are delivered by external contractors. The commodities selected as targets are driven by the current needs of the organisation and known gaps in the understanding of risks associated with specific foods.
The resulting data provides detailed insights into the risk profile of the products in question and informs future risk assessment. The reports of Food Standards Scotland surveys can be found on our food safety research and surveillance section.
