Previous Working Groups
On this page
Skip the menu of subheadings on this page.Risk Communications
Years active:2019-2020
About
The Risk Communication working group provided a gap analysis of the Science Council principles, and advice on how best to turn them into a workable framework. They also provided academic support on a review of existing and recent risk communications frameworks for UK Government, understanding their evolution, how they are used, and what are the learning points one might take forward.
Papers
The Terms of Reference for the ACSS working group on Risk Communication.
Communicating Risk Literature Review
Food and You
About
Years active: 2018-2019
The working group’s procedure included:
- consultation with FSA staff and external stakeholders on the Agency's portfolio of consumer research, with particular reference to the F&Y survey,
- an assessment of the alignment of the different strands of consumer research with the Agency's strategic objectives,
- a review of the F&Y topics and concepts, and
- lessons from contemporary survey research methodology practice.
Papers
Terms of Reference for the Food and You working group on the National Archives (non-accessible).
First Meeting Minutes for the Food and You working group on the National Archives (non-accessible).
Second Meeting Minutes for the Food and You working group on the National Archives (non-accessible).
Recommendations Paper for the Food and You working group on the National Archives (non-accessible).
More information can be found on the Food and You page on the FSA website.
EU Exit
About
Years active: 2019-2020
To ensure that we had an effective and resilient regulatory system in place after EU Exit, the FSA aimed to build a robust evidence-base to understand the economic impact of EU Exit on the food and feed industry and understand how these impacts might affect consumers and public health.
The EU Exit Working Group provided expert advice to improve the FSA’s understanding of the dynamics and scope of the expected changes. In particular, they identified research gaps that the FSA should fill, advised on methodologies to assess the likely impacts on industry and consumers and suggested approaches how the FSA can mitigate expected risks.
Papers
Terms of Reference for the EU Exit Working Group on the National Archives (non-accessible).
EU Exit Working Group Minutes on the National Archives (non-accessible).
Applying Behavioural Science
About
Years active: 2018-2019
In the last two years we have been building internal capability and worked with other government departments and external organisations, including academic institutions, to access relevant expertise and knowledge on how best to apply behavioural science in our engagement with:
- Consumers to ensure food is safe and is what it says it is
- Regulators of food businesses who are responsible for complying with food safety regulation.
This group was set up to review the progress we’ve made and scope out new work in line with emerging priorities. The purpose of this working group was to help assure best practice and outcomes in the application of behavioural science to the upcoming work of the FSA.
Papers
Climate Change and Consumer Behaviour Working Group
About
The FSA has a strong interest in horizon scanning possible responses to climate change and understanding where it might impact its work. This working group helped to highlight and discover trends in climate change responses to aid the FSA in horizon scanning in a 2-phase project. Phase 1 involved holding an expert engagement workshop, to identify behaviours that consumers may engage in in response to climate change concerns. Phase 2 involved running a workshop with FSA policy and operational leads to understand implications of these identified behaviours across FSA areas of work and mitigating activity currently underway. The final report ' The impact of climate change on consumer food behaviours: Identification of potential trends and impacts' is available below, under papers.
Following completion of this work the group has been paused to consider strategic need.
Members
Terms of Reference
Word
ViewCCCB Working Group Terms of Referenceas Word(31.71 KB)
Papers
Working Group Proposition
ViewCCCB Working Group Propositionas PDF(105.73 KB)
CCCB Workshop Summary
ViewCCCB Workshop Summaryas PDF(127.04 KB)
CCCB final workshop report:
The impact of climate change on consumer food behaviours: Identification of potential trends and impacts Report found here
The group last updated the wider committee at the 9th ACSS plenary meeting. Please see the update provided in /Paper 9.5 Climate Change and Consumer Behaviour Working Group - Update (July 2022)
Kitchen Life 2 Working Group
About
The working group, which has come to its natural endpoint, supported the innovative, cross-cutting, and multi-disciplinary research project Kitchen Life 2 (KL2). Kitchen Life 2 is the FSA’s award-winning social science research project that aimed to better understand kitchen behaviours in household and food business kitchens. Fieldwork has ended and outputs have been finalised for this project, with the publication planned for September 2023. Working group members supported the scoping of additional analysis to explore sustainability behaviours. Further, the group attended a workshop in November 2022 to discuss the risky behaviours identified in the study utilising behavioural insights and have reviewed key outputs from the project, including the deep dive reports into the 7 identified risky behaviours and a technical report.
Members
Terms of reference
Click here to view the Terms of reference.
Papers
Proposition
The group provided their final update to the wider committee at the 11th ACSS plenary meeting. Please see Paper 11.2 for the 11th Open ACSS meeting
At the 12th plenary, paper 12.4 presented the reflections of the group and FSA leads, around the extent to which it met its aims, and, points to consider for future working groups. The paper concluded that the ACSS KL2 WG provided a valuable contribution to this research and met all the stated objectives.
Paper 12.4 Kitchen Life 2 Working Group - Reflections (February 2024).
More Information
For more information please contact us, or visit the ACSS website on the National Archives (non-Accessible).