Two research groups in Norway and China are planning a joint call for projects in food safety.
The Research Council of Norway (RCN) and National Natural Science Foundation of China (NSFC) call for proposals will open on June 15 with a deadline of Sept. 2, 2020.
It is open to applications within food safety in aquaculture and land-based food value chains.
Funding is available for projects that address challenges related to two topics, either separately or combined. Proposals must come from eligible research organizations and institutions in Norway and China and the call is only in English.
Two topic areas
The first topic area is optimum food production with maximum control of contaminants and other harmful substances being essential to ensure food and feed safety, but risk factors can still be altered and occur during processing, storing and handling chain to the consumer.
The second covers implementing resource-efficient circular economy principles across the food system while reducing environmental footprints may have unforeseen effects on food safety.
Untraditional applications, circuit focus and cross-applications will present new challenges, generating a need for knowledge about interactions between nutrients and different hazards through the supply chain from production to consumption.
“All raw materials utilized in animal and fish feed are a potential source of contaminants. When introducing new, non-traditional feed ingredients, knowledge about relevant contaminants, the bioavailability, bioaccessibility, bioaccumulation, and biomagnification of these contaminants in animal tissue, and health risks to and the animal itself and humans is crucial,” according to RCN.
The Research Council may provide Norwegian Krone 3 million to 5 million (U.S. $300,000 to $500,000) per project. Funding may be sought for joint researcher projects for two to three years, including dissemination and networking activities such as workshops and conferences. The project must start between Jan. 1, and Aug. 1, 2021.
Norway and China research
A Memorandum of Understanding on collaboration between Norway and China was signed in April 2017. As part of this, RCN and NSFC started a program for joint funding of Sino-Norwegian research projects in mutually agreed fields.
Food safety is the absence, or safe, acceptable levels, of hazards in food that may harm the health of consumers, according to the announcement. Foodborne hazards can be microbiological, chemical or physical, e.g. bacteria, viruses, agricultural, aquacultural and industrial chemicals, heavy metals, radionuclide and pesticide residues.
There is a critical need in assuring food stays safe at every stage of the supply chain from production to harvest, processing, storage, distribution, preparation and consumption.
Plans for publication in peer-review journals accessible in Norway and China are strongly encouraged. Grants to support recruitment of doctoral candidates and postdoctoral fellows should be integral components of the proposal.
Grant applications will be reviewed by an international panel. RCN and NSFC will take the decision on granting or rejecting them. To find out more and apply follow this link.
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