About Food & Pharma

In 2004, Medicon Valley Alliance (MVA) and Øresund Food Network (ØFN) started a new collaboration regarding functional food/nutriceuticals. The unique initiative focuses on the use of food products in disease prevention and treatment. The background is the skyhigh rise in society’s health expenses and the need for new solution models or perhaps even a new health care paradigm for solving future health problems. In addition, several companies’ new food products are currently being tested for their health benefits, and these companies have become members of MVA, while also working with ØFN.

The kick-off event consisted of two Food & Pharma sessions at the BioTech Forum Science Conference in October looking at: 1) the scientific basis of preventive medicine with special emphasis on food; and 2) strategic considerations from a scientific, social and economical viewpoint. Abstracts and presentations from the sessions can be found here.

The discussion from these sessions continued at the seminar ‘The need for enriched foods and food supplements held at the University of Copenhagen in December. Enriched food has recently again become a hot issue in public debate, particularly in Denmark. The seminar presented the current state of knowledge on food enrichment and food supplements and touched upon questions such as: Do we need such products? Is it risky to eat them? Why is there such a big difference in attitude to these questions/problems in Denmark and Sweden?

In 2004, MVA and ØFN also began a collaboration with the health cluster innovation group, which comes under the Danish Innovation Council. The health cluster group is also focusing on the preventive importance of food for the health system of the future. The Danish Innovation Council is a broad and international network of innovators, which aims to identify the opportunities open to Denmark in the global knowledge society. The Council will, among other things, submit proposals for the way in which Denmark can develop new knowledge environments and industries.

In 2005, these activities will be followed by public meetings, e.g. regarding the interesting differences in food legislation between Denmark and Sweden, as well as workshops around selected medical conditions. The overall plan is to agree on a number of recommendations on (improved) food as treatment, and then discuss them publicly in both Denmark and Sweden.

See list of Food & Pharma activities 2005

Cheese tower (source: Chr. Hansen A/S