Food safety challenges associated with traditional foods in Arabic speaking countries of the Middle East

Foodborne diseases continue to be a global public health problem with an estimated 600 million people falling ill annually. In return, international standards are becoming stricter which poses challenges to food trade. In light of the increasing burden of foodborne diseases, many countries in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region have upgraded their food laws and undertaken changes to the organizational structure of their regulatory institutions to maintain or expand international export activities, tighten control on local and imported products, and protect consumers’ health. However, until this date, the published information on the regional health burdens of foodborne diseases is very limited and it is not clear whether the recent changes will serve towards science-based and effective preventive functions and the adoption of the risk management approach. In this review, we summarize the recent food safety issues and the national food control systems of selected countries in the region although we were challenged with the scarcity of information. To this end, we examined the national food safety systems in the context of the five essential elements of the FAO/WHO Guidelines for Strengthening National Food Control Systems. These five elements—food law and regulations; food control management; inspection services; laboratory services; food monitoring; and epidemiological data, information, education, communication, and training—constitute the building blocks of a national food control system, but could also serve as tools to assess the effectiveness of the systems.

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MEANS OF SUGGESTIBILITY AND THEIR EVOLUTION STAGES IN ARABIC SOCIO-POLITICAL ARTICLES

Linguistic and Conceptual Views of the World ◽

10.17721/2520-6397.2019.2.07 ◽

2019 ◽

pp. 56-61

Author(s):

V. V. Dudin

Keyword(s):

Middle East ◽

Multiple Sources ◽

Printed Media ◽

Political Views ◽

Publishing Houses ◽

Temporary Control ◽

Xix Century ◽

Arabic Speaking ◽

First Time ◽

Printed Press

With the dawn of printed press on the shores of the Arabic speaking world, the methods of impacting an individual’s cognition have been changed for the first time in many centuries. The rise of political and socio-political press in the region overall and in Egypt in particular was likely a by-product of Western intervention in the region, more specifically, Napoleon Bonaparte’s campaign resulting in his temporary control of Egypt. It too was Napoleon who created the first publishing houses in Egypt and it was his political views that were being spread through them. Expanding in detail on multiple sources to delve into the relevant periods, we have worked through numerous newspapers and publishers of socio-political articles in the Middle East and have noticed that Egyptian newspapers have managed to be representative of the Arab speaking printed press in the region. Egyptian editori- als have showcased the forefront of suggestive means with the purpose of leaving an imprint on the reader’s cognition, despite the fact that Egypt was not the first nation with a printed press capable of printing in Arabic. In this study we utilise quotes and examples from a range of socio-political press articles, dated as far back as 1967, as we provide examples backing our hypotheses for the changes in suggestive tactics used by the authors and editorials in their relevant periods. However, our goal in this article was not to focus on the suggestive means themselves in depth, but to rather provide evi- dence pointing to the fact that these suggestive methods have in fact undergone a process of evolution in their own right, changing with time and thus becoming more advanced and author-specific in the process. The possibility to spread a specific subjective position of an author in society without a need for speeches and the accompanying crowds became one of the defining factors to impact and shape the Arab speaking society since the XIX century. The eﬃcacy of suggestive means in printed media has remained in present days with further evolution imminent due to the digitalisation of information, thus making suggestibility a more important aspect of printed press to explore than ever before.

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Community, dialect and urbanization in the Arabic-speaking Middle East

Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies ◽

10.1017/s0041977x00010764 ◽

1995 ◽

Vol 58 (2) ◽

pp. 270-287 ◽

Cited By ~ 11

Author(s):

Clive Holes

Keyword(s):

Social Change ◽

Middle East ◽

Social Structure ◽

Case Studies ◽

Language Change ◽

Arab World ◽

Linguistic Change ◽

The Social ◽

Arabic Speaking ◽

Everyday Communication

The purpose of this paper is to explain how changes in the social structure of the countries of the Arabic-speaking Middle East are being reflected in new patterns of dialect use. The last 30 years have seen an enormously increased interest in Arabic as a living mode of everyday communication, reflected in many dialectological, typological and sociolinguistic studies. As a result, we now have a much clearer overall picture of the dialect geography of the eastern Arab world, and the beginnings of an understanding of the dynamics of language change. Inevitably, the focus of many studies has been geographically specific, so that the area-wide nexus between social change and linguistic change has not always been seen in a sufficiently broad context. By examining three case studies documented in the literature, I aim to point up similarities in the dynamics of change which are often obscured by distracting local particularities.

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The Global Online Sexuality Survey (GOSS): Male Homosexuality among Arabic‐Speaking Internet Users in the Middle East—2010

Journal of Sexual Medicine ◽

10.1111/jsm.12634 ◽

2014 ◽

Vol 11 (10) ◽

pp. 2414-2420 ◽

Cited By ~ 6

Author(s):

Osama Shaeer ◽

Kamal Shaeer

Keyword(s):

Middle East ◽

Male Homosexuality ◽

Internet Users ◽

Arabic Speaking

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Safe Food, Dangerous Lands? Traditional Foods and Indigenous Peoples in Canada

Frontiers in Communication ◽

10.3389/fcomm.2021.749944 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 6 ◽

Author(s):

Tabitha Robin ◽

Kristin Burnett ◽

Barbara Parker ◽

Kelly Skinner

Keyword(s):

Food Safety ◽

Food Insecurity ◽

Indigenous Peoples ◽

Food Sovereignty ◽

Settler Colonialism ◽

Well Being ◽

Traditional Foods ◽

Spiritual Well Being ◽

Safe Food ◽

Safety Rules

There is a deep and troubling history on Turtle Island of settler authorities asserting control over traditional foods, market-based and other introduced foods for Indigenous peoples. Efforts to control Indigenous diets and bodies have resulted in direct impacts to the physical, emotional, mental and spiritual well-being of Indigenous peoples. Food insecurity is not only a symptom of settler colonialism, but part of its very architecture. The bricks and mortar of this architecture are seen through the rules and regulations that exist around the sharing and selling of traditional or land-based foods. Risk discourses concerning traditional foods work to the advantage of the settler state, overlooking the essential connections between land and food for Indigenous peoples. This article explores the ways in which the Canadian settler state undermined and continues to undermine Indigenous food sovereignty through the imposition of food safety rules and regulations across federal, provincial, and territorial jurisdictions.

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