MFDS to Conduct Integrated Risk Assessment on 52 Harmful Substances Starting This Year

The Ministry of Food and Drug Safety announced on the 6th that it will conduct an integrated risk assessment for 52 hazardous substances with high concerns such as carcinogenicity, reproductive toxicity, and genotoxicity.

The Ministry of Food and Drug Safety announced the "Smart Hazardous Substance Safety Management Innovation Plan," which was discussed and finalized at the 20th National Policy Issues Ministerial Meeting chaired by Prime Minister Han Duck-soo on the 6th.

Until now, the risk of hazardous substances has been assessed separately for products applied to the human body, such as food and cosmetics, but there have been criticisms that it is limited in confirming the total amount of exposure to hazardous substances affecting humans. Accordingly, this innovation plan was prepared to evaluate the total exposure from various products from a user-centered perspective.

If the risk of hazardous substances is confirmed through the integrated risk assessment, the government will strengthen exposure source management such as product standards and specifications, development of alternative substances, and reduction technologies, and the industry must work on reducing hazardous substances by improving manufacturing processes and using alternative substances.

According to the innovation plan, from next year, the system will transition to a smart hazardous substance assessment system using artificial intelligence (AI) technology. When hazardous substances are input, an AI-based system automatically designs a risk assessment model considering the lifestyle patterns of Koreans, calculates the exposure amount to hazardous substances, and derives the evaluation results on risk.

In addition, from 2025, an AI-based hazardous information collection, analysis, and monitoring system (K-RISS) will be established and operated to collect and analyze potential risk factors in real time.

To alleviate consumers' anxiety about hazardous substances, a "safety alarm service" will also be provided, allowing consumers to easily check exposure sources and amounts of hazardous substances by entering product intake amounts and usage frequency into an app.

Furthermore, to more accurately identify risk factors in products that cause public anxiety, communication channels between consumer organizations and government policies will be activated, and autonomous monitoring activities led by consumers for food and drug safety management will be supported.

The Ministry of Food and Drug Safety plans to disclose data on the public data portal (Open-API) so that academia and industry can utilize risk assessment data to develop hazardous substance exposure reduction technologies and evaluation technologies.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.