On 2011 March 11, 9.0-magnitude earthquake occurred in Japan hitting the northeast coast of Honshu. The earthquake and tsunami have devastated coastal area of Tohoku. Owing to this disaster, the Tokyo Electric Power Company's Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant had several accidents and radiation higher than usual levels was detected in surrounding environment.

Due to this radiation leakage, from the perspective of the Food Sanitation Act, which aims to prevent sanitation hazards resulting from eating and drinking, the "Indices relating to limits on food and drink ingestion" indicated by the Nuclear Safety Commission of Japan was adopted for the time being as provisional regulation values. So the foods which exceed these levels are regulated to ensure those foods are not supplied to the public to eat, and local governments have been notified by the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare on 2011 March 17.

This provisional regulation values were adopted without an assessment of the effect of food on health by FSCJ because of its urgency, therefore on 2011 March 20, the Minister of Health, Labour and Welfare requested FSCJ for an assessment of the effect of food on health.

FSCJ had five extraordinary Commission meetings starting on 2011 March 22, and on 2011 March 29 FSCJ conducted “Emergency Report on Radioactive Nuclides in Foods” so the chairperson of FSCJ notified MHLW of that report on the same day.

Here is a message from FSCJ chairperson Naoko Koizumi on April 8, 2011

FSCJ released “Emergency Report on Radioactive Nuclides in Foods” on March 29, 2011.

(1)

Japanese Government

●Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare
　Restricted areas and vegetables for distribution and/or consumption are published here.
　Also monitoring results: areas and levels of radioactive contaminants in foods.

●Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology
　○Reading of environmental radioactivity level
　○Disaster Prevention and Nuclear Safety Network for Nuclear Environment

(2)

International Organization

●World Health Organization(WHO)
　○FAQs: Japan nuclear concerns
　○International Health Regulations (IHR)

(3)

Others