Copyright © Françoise Herrmann
Today is world health day 2015!
Recognizing widespread food-borne diseases, the UN World Health Organization celebrates food safety this year with the theme: From farm to plate, make food safe.
According to WHO, there are 200 diseases that are caused by unsafe food containing bacteria, chemicals, parasites or viruses
(WHO [1a]). And there are an estimated 2 million death per year arising from the consumption of unsafe food or water
(WHO [1b]).
To combat unsafe food WHO implemented a
Five Keys programme for food safety, available in 87 languages: 1. Keep clean to avoid contamination from hands or utensils, 2. Separate raw from cooked food to avoid cross-contamination, 3. Cook thoroughly, 4. Keep food at safe temperatures (no longer than 2 hours at room temperature, store below 5°C or above 60°C before serving), 5. Use safe water and raw materials
(WHO [2]).
Food safety standards (Codex Alimentarius) have been developed jointly by the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) and WHO, covering 186 member states. The Codex endeavors to create harmonized international food safety standards for the protection of consumers. WHO provides scientific information on microbiological and chemical hazards
(Codex [1]).
The Codex Alimentarius includes 341 records in its list of standards, including such items as: Guidelines for food labeling, Guidelines for formulated complementary foods for older infants and young children, Standards for canned baby food or Standards for the prevention and reduction of lead contamination in food. (
Codex [2]).
For more information, see the
UN WHO Fact sheet on food safety (
WHO [3]).
Good health to you all on World Health day 2015!
References
WHO [1a] World health day 2015 – Food safety – The gobal view
http://www.who.int/campaigns/world-health-day/2015/en/
WHO [1b] World health day 2015 – From farm to plate, make food safe.
http://www.who.int/mediacentre/news/releases/2015/food-safety/en/
WHO [2] Five keys programme for food safety
http://www.who.int/foodsafety/areas_work/food-hygiene/5keys/en/
http://www.who.int/foodsafety/publications/consumer/en/5keys_en.pdf?ua=1 [English 5 keys flyer]
WHO [3] Fact sheet on food safety
http://www.who.int/campaigns/world-health-day/2015/fact-sheet.pdf?ua=1
WHO [4] Food safety Quizz
http://www.who.int/features/qa/food-safety/quiz/en/
Codex [1] Codex Alimentarius - Food Safety Standards
http://www.codexalimentarius.org/
Codex [2] Codex Alimentarius – List of standards
http://www.codexalimentarius.org/standards/list-of-standards/
The competition includes five categories (industry, small and medium-sized enterprises, research, non-European Patent Organization countries and life-time achievement), and in each category three finalists. The selected finalists have all contributed inventions to make life easier, to enhance economic development, to promote the creation of jobs, and in many instances to save human lives. The awards ceremony will take place in Paris this year, on June 11, at the magnificent and historical landmark Palais Brongniart.
In comes L’Arbre à vent® (the wind tree), researched and developed by NewWind®, with a radically new design. Indeed, instead of long rotating blades mounted on a shaft, way up in the sky, where it is most dangerous for the birds, and reminiscent of the old fashioned wind-mill, L’Arbre à vent® looks like a tree, with lots of green leaves (80 to 150 leaves generating about 3 kW of power). 
Only, on the NewWind® tree, each leaf is specifically designed to function as a small vertical turbine, with its own generator! And each leaf has a patented position on a branch, so that it does not obstruct the wind coming in as a source of energy for another leaf, and a patented contact surface with the wind, ranging from 8 to 64 cm.The invention relates to an aerogenerator (100) comprising a trunk (10) and a plurality of branches (20, 21, 22, 23) extending from this trunk (10), characterized in that it comprises: - a plurality of turbines (31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 31') distributed over the various branches, each turbine having a vertical axis of rotation (40, 40'); and - an electric generator (50, 50') mounted inside each turbine on the axis of rotation of said turbine. [Abstract EP2825770]
