Research News

Food security: helping make the world‘s food supply safe

Researchers from around the world are coming to Vanderbilt University to discuss food security. The one-day conference called “From Hand to Mouth, Via the Lab and the Legislature: International and Domestic Regulations to Secure the Food Supply” will be held on Feb. 16, at Vanderbilt Law School.

Researchers will present papers on a series of topics including the impact of agro-terrorism; the role of international agreements in achieving food security; what tragedy teaches us about 100-year-old food laws; food-borne infections and the global food supply and regulating food aid in disasters.

At the World Food Summit in 1996, leaders from more than 150 nations found that although more food was being grown and produced around the world, the number of people affected by hunger and poor nutrition remained the same.

As a result, the delegates pledged themselves to “reduce the number of undernourished people to half their present level no later than 2015.” The symposium at Vanderbilt will assess how American and international regulators, as well as private enterprises, have improved food security since 1996. The experts will also discuss how legal systems can be improved to accomplish these goals.

The conference is being organized by Vanderbilt law students. It will be held at Flynn Auditorium from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m.

For more information about Vanderbilt, visit the News Service homepage at www.vanderbilt.edu/news.

Media Contact: Amy Wolf, (615) 322-NEWS
amy.wolf@vanderbilt.edu