ANSES and INRA renew their partnership for five more years
In the presence of Bruno Le Maire, Minister of the Economy and Finance, Stéphane Travert, Minister of Agriculture and Food, and Brune Poirson, Secretary of State to the Minister for Ecological and Inclusive Transition, Roger Genet, Director General of ANSES, and Philippe Mauguin, President of the National Institute of Agronomic Research (INRA), have renewed the partnership framework agreement between the two organisations for five years. The purpose of this agreement is to strengthen the many joint actions currently being pursued in the areas of animal health and welfare, plant health and protection, food and nutrition, ecotoxicology and the quality of the environment.
ANSES and INRA are longstanding partners in the areas of animal health, plant health, and food safety.
Their partnerships take many forms:
- in the field of research, via Joint Research Units, jointly-funded study grants for doctoral students and numerous research projects;
- through technology platforms made available reciprocally to the research teams of the two organisations;
- in the field of expert appraisal, via the participation of many of INRA’s research scientists in the expert groups set up by ANSES, especially in the areas of plant health, animal health, the nutritional value and safety of food, biotechnology and the assessment of plant protection products.
At a time when all players in the field are investing heavily in the development of sustainable models for the production and supply of food, the two organisations will be called upon to cooperate even more closely in their task of producing knowledge and supporting public decision-making over the next five years.
The renewal of the framework agreement between ANSES and INRA covers the areas of animal health and welfare, plant health and protection, food and nutrition, ecotoxicology and the quality of the environment.
This will include:
- preserving biodiversity and making the fullest possible use of biological resources;
- undertaking work to reduce the use of antibiotics in animal husbandry and of plant protection products in agriculture, and proposing agro-ecological alternatives;
- contributing to animal welfare, in both its ethical and operational aspects;
- carrying out studies and actions in the field of occupational health and safety in agriculture and its related sectors;
- setting up methodology and multi-criteria impact studies, including the socio-economic aspects, modes of production and consumption, and regulatory measures to reduce health risks;
- facilitating access to public data regarding surveys into consumption and exposure to environmental contaminants, the contamination of soil and crops, food, livestock, produce and the environment, and also the nutritional composition of animal feed and human food;
- studying the impacts of biological and chemical contaminants on the environment or target organisms, providing input for the vigilance schemes contributing to risk assessment and exploiting them;
- characterising pathogens and their vectors, developing methods for epidemiological surveillance in the areas of animal and plant health, and the safety of human food.
As a national research organisation, lNRA’s role is to organise, execute, and exploit all research that relates to food, agriculture and the environment. lNRA can call on specialists from the life sciences, the engineering and environmental sciences, and also the social and economic sciences. Its tasks are to produce and disseminate scientific knowledge, to contribute to the design of innovations and develop know-how for the benefit of society, to bring its expertise to bear on informing decision-makers in the public and private spheres, to use its research activities to train future researchers, to develop scientific and technical knowledge and to participate in the debate between science and society.
The central role of the French Agency for Food, Environmental and Occupational Health & Safety (ANSES) is to assess health risks to assist public policy-makers, in the areas of food, the environment, work, animal health and welfare, and plant health. Through its expert appraisal, research and monitoring activities, the Agency covers all the risks (microbiological, physical or chemical) to which a person may be exposed, intentionally or otherwise, at all ages and times of their life. Its opinions and recommendations are systematically made public and provide insights for public debate and policy-making.