SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS

The Executive Committee:

• expressed appreciation for the significant financial contributions to the Joint FAO/WHO Food Standards Programme provided by FAO, WHO and host governments (para. 4);
• requested that a description and an estimate of support for developing countries provided by FAO and WHO be provided to its next session (para. 6);
• noted that the Codex Committee on Edible Ices had been abolished (para. 10);
• abolished, subject to confirmation by the Commission, the following bodies and proposed arrangements for assigning their work to other Committees (paras. 11-15):

- Joint ECE/Codex Group of Experts on the Standardization of Quick Frozen Foods
- Joint ECE/Codex Group of Experts on the Standardization of Fruit Juices.

• Amended the draft Medium-Term Plan 1998-2002 to provide for a new Programme Area on Strengthening Transparency and included a provision for consideration of a general standard for foods prepared from biotechnology (paras. 16-20);
• called on FAO and WHO to ensure that the preparations for the convening of a consultation on food microbiological risk assessment would be transparent and include input from the Committee on Food Hygiene and from Members (para. 22);
• called for effective follow-up to be made on providing expert advice on the question of food allergies and intolerances (para. 23);
• expressed concern that careful consideration had to be given by Codex Committees when proposing new work to the Criteria set out in the Procedural Manual and asked the Secretariat to prepare a paper on a review of the criteria for new work and guidelines for the establishment of “inclusive” standards (para. 27);
• approved a number of proposals for new work (para. 26-28 and Appendix 3);
• advanced a number of proposed draft standards to Step 5 of the Codex procedure (para. 29-30 and Appendix 4);
• agreed to the withdrawal of certain MRLs for veterinary drug residues, subject to confirmation by the Commission (paras. 31-32);
• discussed in depth the matter of Judgement of Equivalence and made several recommendations (paras 35-36);
• considered the reply from the Chairman of the WTO Committee on Sanitary and Phyto-sanitary Measures on the status of Codex advisory texts (paras. 41-44);
• recommended that the draft provisional agenda for the 23^rd Session of the Codex Alimentarius Commission be submitted to the Directors-General of FAO and WHO (para. 45);
• welcomed informal meetings of Chairpersons of Codex Committees, but stressed that such meetings should remain informal and without a formal agenda (paras. 46-48);
• noted that the findings of the Study Group a joint FAO/WHO/IAEA Study Group on High Dose Food Irradiation could lead to a revision of the Codex General Standard for Irradiated Foods and other texts (para. 49); and
• noted changes in documentation services (para. 50).