The FSA is today publishing a summary of food incidents handled between April and June 2016. This list summarises alerts issued by the FSA to recall or withdraw products.

Over the three month period, we issued 47 food notices, of which 25 were allergy alerts, with the top three undeclared allergens being milk, gluten, and soya.

The information published today describes the overall details of the incident, the level of risk to consumers and what action we, industry and/or local authorities took. It has been collated by the FSA to make it easier for consumers to access incident information.

The FSA plays an important role in helping the food industry and local authorities to warn the public of possible risks with the food they buy. We deal with around 1,500 incidents every year. These are defined as any event where there is an actual or suspected threat to the safety or quality of food, and where intervention maybe needed to protect the public.

Food incidents can range from undeclared allergens to food poisoning outbreaks. The most common incidents involve microbiological or chemical contamination of food or animal feed, and can require food products to be withdrawn from sale or recalled from consumers.

In the UK, food businesses are legally obliged to report any food incident to the FSA. Once alerted to the problem our incidents team will work with the business and local authority enforcement officers to assess the risk and trace the affected products.

Each year, a small number of incidents or investigations are put forward for a detailed review so that the FSA can make improvements and identify lessons learned.

http://www.food.gov.uk/news-updates/news/2016/15370/fsa-publishes-list-of-incidents-for-april-to-june-2016