Master Allergen Control, Strengthen Food Safety Cultures & Unlock AI-Driven Supply Chain Transparency Whilst Upholding Regulatory Confidence:
Critical New Insights For Risk-Smart, Regulation-Ready & Consumer-Trusted Food & Drink Safety Strategies
OPENING ADDRESS
09.00 Chair's Welcome & Opening Address
Nick Martin, Chief Food Safety & Quality Officer, Fox’s Burton’s Companies
Demi Mardyri, Head of Technical, Oscar Mayer
Session | AI In Food Safety
Beyond The Hype: What AI Actually Changes For The Person Running A HACCP Plan
- Forget the theory: what does AI change day-to-day for a food safety professional managing a live HACCP plan in a real facility?
- From predictive monitoring and documentation support to supplier risk screening, identify the tools already proven in food safety settings
- Live poll: benchmark where your organisation sits on AI adoption and understand where the biggest readiness gaps currently are across the sector
- The real barriers are rarely technical – tackle data quality, legacy system integration and internal buy-in before the investment goes in
- Where does human judgment remain irreplaceable, and where is handing the task to an algorithm the smarter, safer choice?
Chloe Pallister, Senior Quality Specialist R&D, Nestle
Panel Discussion | Safety Culture
We Have Been Talking About Food Safety Culture For 20 Years… What Is Still Not Working?
- Culture surveys and training programmes have been the default tools for decades – so why are the same problems repeating? Interrogate what current interventions are missing
- What actually changes behaviour at line level, and what makes safety feel personally relevant to a long-standing employee who has heard the message hundreds of times?
- Explore how to measure food safety culture in a way that produces meaningful insight rather than a false sense of progress
- From psychological safety to speaking-up culture, understand the leadership conditions that make concerns surface early rather than get buried
Bizhan Pourkomailian, Global Food Safety Director, Restaurant & Distribution, McDonald’s
Peter Chandley, Head of Quality & Food Safety, Weetabix
Julian Durrant, QA Manager & ESG Lead, Papa Johns
Jacques-Noel Sacramento, Head of Technical, Salisbury Poultry (Midlands)
Panel Discussion | Allergen Management
Allergen Management In 2027: New Legislation, Labelling Decisions & Where the Accountability Lies
- The new allergen legislation is live: what do the requirements for trained governing bodies, allergen champions and EpiPen provision mean for food manufacturers and suppliers in practice?
- Precautionary labelling and ‘may contain’ decisions are under increasing scrutiny
- Examine when precautionary statements protect consumers and when they undermine confidence
- In a complex, multi-tier supply chain, accountability for allergen cross-contamination does not sit in one place – map where the responsibilities actually lie
- Leave with practical tools for allergen risk communication across packaging, labelling, food service channels and digital product information
Nick Smith, Head of Technical, Absolute Taste
Mark Armstrong, HSE & Technical Services Director, Compass Group UK and Ireland
Mohammad Abdo, QA & Food Safety Lead, PepsiCo
Jacques Noel, Head of Technical, Salisbury Poultry (Midlands)
Jeremy Lockley, Senior Director, Food Safety & Quality Assurance, Five Guys
10:30 Morning Networking Break & Sponsor Stands
11:00 Session | Reserved For Conference Partner Case Study
Session | Food Fraud & Traceability
Real Or Fake? Food Integrity, Traceability, AI, Food Fraud & The Lab Report Problem
- Traceability is the operational foundation of food integrity – understand the minimum capability your business needs to trace a product from field to fork under genuine pressure
- Food fraud is not a new risk, but the tactics are evolving: examine the scenarios that keep appearing in incident reports and what they have in common
- A specific and emerging vulnerability: AI is making it easier to forge certificates of analysis and laboratory reports – understand what this looks like and how to validate documentation effectively
- Think like an adversary, not just an auditor – the mindset shift that changes how you approach food fraud risk across your entire supply chain
Frank Braun, Chief Sustainability Officer, Halssen & Lyon
11:45 Session | Reserved For Conference Partner Case Study
Fireside Chat | Crisis
Leading Through A Crisis: What A Food Safety Incident Really Tests
- No slides, no script: two guests in open conversation with the chair on what a serious food safety incident does to an organisation from the inside
- How does leadership hold together when a product recall hits, the media are calling and the regulator is at the door?
- The consumer relationship after a crisis is rarely repaired the way organisations expect – hear what actually works and what makes it worse
- What lasting cultural legacy does a significant incident leave, and how do the best organisations convert crisis into genuine long-term improvement?
Caroline Dennis, Head of Food Technical, Gousto
12.35 Lunch For Delegates, Speakers & Partners
13.05 Hosted Peer-To-Peer Lunchtime Discussions
A) AI Governance In Practice
Demi Mardyri, Head of Technical, Oscar Mayer
B) Supply Chain Diversification & Due Diligence
Joseph Okereke, QA Manager, Taiko Foods
C) Recalls & Building Consumer Trust
D) Clean Labels
Mehdi Adjiri, Global Head of Supplier & External Manufacturing, Quality & Food Safety, Pladis
E) Environmental Monitoring
F) Sustainability
13:35 Afternoon Co-Chairs' Opening Remarks
James Donarski, Senior Manager, Global Food Chemical Safety & Risk, McCormick (UK) Ltd
Claire Yates, Senior Technical Manager, Co-op
Lightening Round | A New Perspective
Lightning Round: One Data Point That Changed How You Think
- Five speakers from across the day, four minutes each and one slide maximum – the energy reset the afternoon deserves!
- Each speaker shares a single statistic, finding, incident or data point from their own work that genuinely shifted their thinking on food safety
- Walk away with five perspectives you had not considered before lunch
Dunni George, Technical Manager, Hovis
Joseph Okereke, QA Manager, Taiko Foods
Session | A New Perspective
Regulations, Audits & The Compliance Gap: Are We Actually Getting Safer?
- The latest direction from the FSA and EFSA and understand what is coming in the regulatory pipeline for 2027 and beyond
- Recalls are not decreasing even as more businesses pass more audits – examine the hard evidence that current frameworks can create a false sense of security
- Where does the gap between paper compliance and real-world food safety robustness come from, and whose responsibility is it to close it?
- Explore what better audit design, more meaningful metrics and a more honest relationship with regulators could look like in practice
Mohammad Abdo, QA & Food Safety Lead, PepsiCo
14.35 Session | Reserved For Conference Partner Case Study
Session | Contaminants, Microplastics & Microbiological Risks
What The Science Actually Says: New Contaminants, Microplastics & Microbiological Risks
- The science on microplastics, nanoplastics and BPA is moving faster than regulatory frameworks can follow – understand what the peer-reviewed evidence actually says and what it means for food safety practice
- As analytical methods become more sensitive, new contaminants are appearing in testing that were not detectable before – examine which emerging risks warrant action now
- The EU/2073/2005 shelf-life testing requirements are changing: understand what the imminent Listeria regulation update means for your processes and timelines
Indranil Ray, Senior Director – Technical, Barry Callebaut
15.25 Afternoon Informal Networking Break
15.55 Session | Reserved For Conference Partner Case Study
Challenge Clinic | Practical Problems Solved
Practical Challenges Clinic: Bring Your Biggest Problem
- The most interactive session of the day: three real food safety challenges collected from delegates worked through live by a panel of four practitioners
- Leave with practical thinking on the challenge that has been sitting on your desk, heard through the honest lens of people who have faced something similar
Sarah Delaney, Global Food Safety Leader, Inter Ikea
Double Persepctive | Horizon Scanning & The Future Of Food Safety Excellence
From Culture To Code: What Does Food Safety Excellence Look Like in 2030?
- Closing the loop: the panel maps a specific, grounded vision of best-in-class food safety operations in three years’ time – not aspiration, but practical direction
- How do AI, regulatory change, supply chain pressure and the human dimension of food safety leadership combine in the organisations leading the field by 2030?
- The culture thread runs back through this session deliberately – what does it mean to have both the values and the systems to be truly excellent in food safety?
- Where do you go from here? The panel closes with three actions every delegate can take back to their organisation on Monday morning
Soct Mcdonald, Director – Global Food Safety and Sanitation Programmes, Mondelez International
Hamid Mehdi-Zodeh, Quality Business Partner, Arla Foods
17.05 Afternoon Co-Chairs’ Closing Remarks & Official Close of Conference
James Donarski, Senior Manager, Global Food Chemical Safety & Risk, McCormick (UK) Ltd
Claire Yates, Senior Technical Manager, Co-op