1. The Tenth Session of the Joint FAO/WHO Codex Alimentarius Commission was held at FAO Headquarters, Rome from 1 to 11 July 1974. The session was attended by 301 participants, including the representatives and observers of 58 countries and observers from 31 international organizations (see Appendix I for the List of Participants).
2. The Commission was presided over by its Chairman, Mr. A. Miklovicz (Hungary) and its three Vice-Chairmen, Dr. D.G. Chapman (Canada), Dr. E. Matthey (Switzerland) and Dr. E. Méndez (Mexico). The Joint Secretaries were Mr. G.O. Kermode and Mr. H.J. McNally (FAO) and Dr. J. Munn and Dr. L. Reinius (WHO).
3. The Commission was informed of the death of President Peron of Argentina. The Commission observed a minute's silence in honour of his memory and the condolences of the Commission were conveyed to the Representative of the Government and the people of Argentina.
4. The Commission paid tribute to the memory of Dr. A. Ginsberg, who had been extremely active in all aspects of the Commission's work on meat from the outset. During the course of his life in various parts of the world he had, as a widely acknowledged expert in his field, played an important role in promoting meat hygiene. Dr. Ginsberg did much of the initial basic work on the codes now progressing in the Committee on Meat Hygiene and had continued to be active in their development. The Commission observed a minute's silence as a mark of respect for Dr. Ginsberg and requested the New Zealand delegation to convey its sincere condolences to Dr. Ginsberg's wife and family.
5. The Tenth Session of the Joint FAO/WHO Codex Alimentarius Commission was convened by the Directors-General of FAO and WHO and was opened, on behalf of both Directors-General with a speech of welcome by Mr. R.I. Jackson, Deputy Director-General of FAO.
6. Mr. Jackson referred to the sustained and indeed growing interest shown by the Member Nations of FAO and WHO in the work of the Commission, as evidenced by the fact that five more countries had become Members of the Commission since its last session, bringing the current membership up to 103 countries. He welcomed especially the representatives of the new Members of the Commission and also the representatives of observer countries participating for the first time at a session of the Commission.
7. He also referred to the encouraging responses received from governments concerning acceptances and action being taken by them in regard to the Recommended Codex Standards. He drew particular attention to the fact that, whilst most of the acceptances to date had come from developing countries, acceptances had also been received from a number of developed countries and many other developed countries had indicated in their replies how seriously they took the Recommended Codex Standards.
8. He referred to the fact that, in recent times, the Commission had been turning its attention more and more to the needs of the developing countries. The Joint FAO/WHO Food Standards Regional Conference for Africa, which had been kindly hosted by the Government of Kenya, was held in Nairobi in October 1973, and a Coordinating Committee for Africa, which had been set up by the Commission at its last session, held its first meeting at FAO headquarters in Rome from 24 to 27 June 1974. He also referred to the steps contemplated by the Commission with the object of assisting developing countries in other parts of the world, including the holding of a Joint FAO/WHO Food Standards Regional Conference for Asia in the second half of 1975.
9. He recalled that the Director-General of FAO had carried out an internal reorganization of the units of FAO concerned with food standards and food control. The Food Standards Programme was now backed up by a Food Science and Consumer Protection Group which had recently been strengthened and the two groups together made up the Food Standards and Food Science Service. The Food Science and Consumer Protection Group was playing an important role in assisting developing countries at a national level to strengthen their food control services and legislation to facilitate the implementation of the commission's recommendations. He also referred to the important back-stopping which WHO was providing to the Programme. In addition, he drew attention to the fact that the Commission would have an opportunity during the course of its session of reviewing the action which had been taken by FAO and WHO in concert with the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) in order to give effect to certain Resolutions adopted by the UN Conference on Human Environment held in Stockholm in June 1972.
10. Mr. Jackson concluded by expressing the appreciation of FAO and WHO to those governments which had undertaken the onerous task of chairing and hosting sessions of the Commission's subsidiary bodies during the last 18 months.
11. The Commission adopted the Provisional Agenda and Timetable for its Tenth Session as presented.
