290. The Commission decided to consider agenda items 30 and 31 together. The Secretariat introduced documents CX/AFRICA 73/9, Report of the Joint FAO/WHO Food Standards Regional Conference for Africa and ALINORM 74/28, Report of the First Session of the Coordinating Committee for Africa.
291. The Secretariat expressed the appreciation of FAO and WHO to the Government of Kenya for hosting the Regional Conference for Africa and pointed out that the Conference had proved to be extremely valuable to the participating countries and the Secretariat in highlighting the problems of Africa, and the need for better food legislation and strengthening the infrastructure for laboratories and inspection personnel. The Secretariat emphasized two points in the report of the First Session of the Coordinating Committee for Africa: firstly the generous offer of the Government of Ghana to host the Second Session of the Committee, and secondly, the unanimous recommendation of the Committee that Dr. R. Oteng be appointed to serve as Coordinator until the end of the 11th Session of the Commission.
292. Concerning the role of coordinators, it was stated that the Secretariat had been requested to prepare a paper for consideration by the Executive Committee at its next session, dealing in particular with the role of Coordinators in developing regions.
293. Mr. Odero of the delegation of Kenya, who had served as Chairman of the Conference, expressed the thanks of the Government of Kenya to the Directors-General of FAO and WHO and the Secretariat for their assistance in holding the Food Standards Regional Conference for Africa. He pointed out that, although the attendance at the Conference had not been as large as had been hoped as not all African Member Countries had participated, it had nevertheless been a fruitful and valuable Conference. It was requested that the Codex Contact Points be made more effective by ensuring that the people involved in food control and the Commission's work became the contact points, and received the Codex documents, including invitations to meetings. He also pointed out that the report of the Conference contained several important recommendations to FAO and WHO, other international agencies and the countries of the region, and expressed the wish that these recommendations be implemented as quickly as possible.
294. On another topic, the delegation of Kenya stressed the point that any aid in strengthening food control infrastructure should be through international agencies, if possible, to ensure the broadest possible approach.
295. Mr. Akoh, the delegate of Nigeria, who had served as Chairman of the First Session of the Coordinating Committee, drew attention to the section of the report of the First Session of the Coordinating Committee for Africa concerning ways and means of assisting the countries of the region to improve their food control systems. It was pointed out that most countries needed to strengthen their food control infrastructure and that a greater awareness of the need for this was necessary with regard to each country. It was also pointed out that there was an urgent need for the formation of regional centres for the training of food control personnel, once the governments had given adequate emphasis to the matter of food legislation and control.
296. The delegate of Nigeria also drew attention to the deliberations of the Committee with regard to the role of the Coordinator. The view of the Coordinating Committee was that the Coordinator should be furnished some financial assistance to make his role effective, although the Committee had recognized that during the next 18 months this might not be possible. The delegate of Nigeria requested that the Coordinator and the Secretariat approach other international organizations such as ECA, OAU and UNDP for support to the Coordinating Committee, in addition to utilizing any savings from the regular budgets of FAO/WHO for this purpose.
297. Several delegations from Africa agreed with the statement of Nigeria with regard to assistance for the Coordinator to make his role fully effective. They pointed out that meetings in Africa would be less expensive for the African delegations to attend, and that the Coordinator should be given assistance to enable him to contact and to visit Member Countries of Africa.
298. The delegation of Senegal pointed out that during the Regional Conference, their delegation had submitted their views on the role of the Coordinating Committee and had requested that these be highlighted as an Appendix to the report of the Coordinating Committee. The Secretariat agreed to review this document from Senegal and include an extract of it in the report.
299. The delegation of Senegal expressed their particular thanks to Dr. E. Matthey of Switzerland for recently visiting several of the francophone countries of West Africa to assist them in strengthening their food control infrastructures.
300. The delegation of Australia expressed its appreciation with the content of document CX/AFRICA 73/9 and stated that it had been widely circulated in Australia to bring the views of the African Member Countries and of the Secretariat to the attention of the appropriate authorities.
301. The Commission noted that the Secretariat would prepare a paper on the role of the Coordinator to be considered by the Executive Committee and the views of the Executive Committee would be placed before the next session of the Commission. It further expressed the appreciation of the Commission for the generous offer of the Government of Ghana to host the next session of the Coordinating Committee for Africa and the Commission agreed unanimously to appoint Dr. R. Oteng as Coordinator for Africa, until the end of the 11th Session of the Commission. Dr. Oteng of Ghana accepted the role of the Coordinator and expressed his thanks for the Commission's action and stated that the Government of Ghana was pleased and honoured to be selected to hos the Second Session of the Coordinating Committee.
302. At its 9th Session the Commission had considered a recommendation of the delegates present from the Asian Region to take the necessary steps to enable the establishment of a Coordinating Committee for the region. The Commission had agreed that the Executive Committee should study the request.
303. The Executive Committee in its deliberations (July 1973) considered that in the absence of a clear expression of opinion from at least a majority of the members of the Commission in Asia and in the light of the current financial difficulties of the Food Standards Programme there would be no prospect of funds being found for holding a session of a Coordinating Committee for Asia in 1974/75. The Executive Committee noted, however, that a provision had been included in the proposed budget for 1974/75 for the holding of an FAO/WHO Food Standards Regional Conference for Asia.
304. The Secretariat informed the Commission that the Regional Conference would be organized on substantially the same lines as the FAO/WHO Food Standards Regional Conference for Africa held in Nairobi in October 1973. Steps had been taken to gather data by sending out a questionnaire to the Codex Contact Points in the Region requesting information on food legislation, food control and trade in and consumption of principal types of processed foods, as had been done for the Regional Conference in Africa.
305. The representative of the Region (delegate of Thailand) expressed his satisfaction that a Regional Conference for Asia had been budgeted for, and would be held in the second half of 1975. He expressed appreciation at the preliminary action taken by the Secretariat and further requested it, in connection with the venue of the Conference, to send out a circular letter to the governments concerned informing them in full about the financial and administrative implications for hosting the Conference and the obligations related to a Coordinating Committee for Asia, if such were to be established. He thought it useful to bring this information to the attention of governments in order not to deprive any eligible member of the region of the possibility to indicate its willingness to host the Conference and meetings of a Coordinating Committee. The Secretariat indicated that there would be a shortfall of $5000 to $6000 in the approved budget for the Conference, because of rising costs, and it was agreed that this matter might be mentioned in the circular letter with a view to seeing whether assistance could be obtained from an intending host government. Moreover none of the Asian delegations present at the session out of a total of 22 members in the region had a mandate to accept hosting one of the activities and taking on the responsibilities involved. In view of the fact that the Conference was scheduled to take place in the second half of 1975, it was considered that there would be adequate time to assemble the required information.
306. On behalf of ASMO the delegation of Kuwait confirmed the interest of that Organization in the work to be undertaken and further stated that the ASMO members would be duly informed of the developments to promote their active participation. The Arab States in the region of Asia, felt fairly strongly about the establishment of a Coordinating Committee for Asia. They requested that a food standards regional conference for Asia should take place as scheduled in the second half of 1975 and proposed that the conference should discuss the establishment of a Coordinating Committee for Asia.
307. Several delegates stressed the advantage of creating National Codex Committees to coordinate the work of the various Ministries involved in food legislation and standards work. They explained that the limited number of proponents from the Asian region for a Regional Conference and Coordinating Committee should not be misinterpreted as lack of interest, which seemed to be the view of the Executive Committee. The delegate of Iran stated that by developing food legislation and food control in his country the present practice of some overseas exporters of dumping inferior products on the market had been reduced considerably. He also pointed out that the introduction in his country of improved food legislation and control had also led to improved quality of their export products. The delegate of Kuwait stated that while the Commission was doing a lot of work in the formulation of food standards dealing with luxury food, his country was in need of standards dealing with basic commodities such as rice and other foods consumed throughout the Region of Asia. He also mentioned that their markets were full of sub-standard food that had been rejected by developed countries. For this reason he stressed the need for the establishment of a Coordinating Committee for Asia.
308. The representative of IOCU pointed out that during the Regional Conference of his Organization held recently in Singapore and at which there were 100 participants representing 20 countries, one of the recommendations had been that a Joint FAO/WHO Food Standards Regional Conference for Asia be held to deal in particular with consumer protection, nutritional and food standards problems which were quite different from those in developed countries. At the IOCU Regional Meeting it had further been stated that some of the Codex standards did not take into account sufficiently the specific conditions prevailing in Asia. He further suggested that the Regional Conference deal, as a separate agenda item, with the important matters of enforcement.
309. The Commission agreed with the need for holding the Regional Conference as scheduled in the second half of 1975 and concurred with a suggestion that with regard to the financial difficulties all possible sources should be approached, for example possible donor countries.
310. The Commission recommended that other bodies involved in the field of standardization such as the Asian Standards Advisory Committee (ASAC), a subsidiary of ECAFE, and which would hold its 4th Session in Kuala Lumpur in 1974, and also ISO should be contacted and that these bodies should further be invited to the Conference in order to avoid duplication of work. The Commission noted that member countries of the South West Pacific Region as well as members of the South Western Pacific Commission would be invited to the Conference. A circular letter would be issued which would again draw attention to the questionnaire sent to governments in the Region requesting in the case of legislation that a summary of the scope and basic provisions of legislation be provided in English or French.
