Call for Expressions of Interest for External Experts of the Scientific Committee of the European Food Safety Authority (Parma, Italy)

(2008/C 70/08)

The European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) is the keystone of European Union (EU) risk assessment regarding food and feed safety; its independent scientific advice underpins the policies and decisions of risk managers in the European Institutions and EU Member States.

EFSA has set up a selection procedure that aims to draw up a reserve list of:

Scientific Experts to be considered as External Experts of the EFSA Scientific Committee

Ref.: EFSA/S/2008/001

The call is addressed to leading scientists with a broad expertise in science-based risk assessment wishing to be considered as external experts of EFSA's Scientific Committee. The required expertise of the external experts is within the field of EFSA's remit, e.g. in:

human health risk assessment, food consumption and exposure assessment, environmental risk assessment, animal health risk assessment, toxicology, microbiology, human nutrition, epidemiology, animal health, animal welfare, human medicine, veterinary medicine, food hygiene, food technology, chemistry, biology, biochemistry, life sciences.

The reserve list will be used to identify and select external experts for the EFSA Scientific Committee. It is expected that in 2008 two experts will be appointed from this reserve list to support the work of the Scientific Committee members.

The role of EFSA

EFSA brings together Europe's leading scientists in risk assessment in the field of food and feed safety, to provide the European Commission, Member States and the European Parliament with scientific advice of the highest standard. EFSA's most critical commitment is to provide objective, transparent and independent scientific advice and clear communication grounded in the most up-to-date scientific methodologies, information and data available.

Since EFSA's advice serves to inform the policies and decisions of risk managers, a large part of EFSA's work is undertaken in response to specific requests for scientific advice. Requests for scientific assessments are received from the European Commission, the European Parliament and EU Member States. EFSA also undertakes scientific work on its own initiative, so-called self-tasking.

Through its Scientific Committee, Scientific Panels and Working Groups, EFSA undertakes to respond quickly and proactively to urgent issues and emerging risks.

For more information on EFSA, please see:

http://www.efsa.europa.eu

The role of the EFSA Scientific Committee

EFSA's Scientific Committee provide scientific opinions and advice, support the work of EFSA's Scientific Panels on scientific matters of a horizontal nature. It is also responsible for general co-ordination to ensure consistency in the scientific opinions prepared by the Scientific Panels. Another role of the Scientific Committee is in developing harmonised risk assessment methodologies in fields where EU-wide approaches are not already defined.

The Scientific Committee is composed of the Chairs of the Scientific Panels and six additional independent experts who do not belong to any of the Scientific Panels.

For more information on EFSA Scientific Committee:

http://www.efsa.europa.eu/EFSA/ScientificPanels/efsa_locale-1178620753812_ScientificCommittee.htm

The work of the external experts of the Scientific Committee

The external experts of the Scientific Committee will support the work of the Scientific Committee members and be invited to attend and contribute to all meetings of the Scientific Committee. It is estimated that the Scientific Committee meets five to six times per year in two-day meetings usually in Parma, Italy. The external experts are also supporting the work of the Scientific Committee members through the participation in working groups, as appropriate, and this will mean attending additional meetings. Applicants should take into account that meetings generally involve preparatory work and that meetings and most documents are in English.

The external experts of the Scientific Committee are entitled to a compensation decided by EFSA Management Board for each full day meeting (currently EUR 300). In addition, experts receive subsistence allowance and incurred travelling expenses.

Selection procedure

A.   Eligibility criteria

Applicants must have:

B.   Selection criteria

Selection process, appointment and term

Experts meeting the eligibility requirements will be submitted to a comparative evaluation carried out by EFSA on the basis of the selection criteria given above. EFSA reserves the right to consult third parties on the professional experience of experts as mentioned in their expression of interest. The selected external experts will initially be appointed for one year, which is renewable.

Experts meeting the requirement to become external experts of the Scientific Committee but who are not appointed will be retained on the reserve list. The reserve list may be used for similar activities and will be valid until 31 December 2009. The validity of the reserve list may be extended. The experts in the reserve list will also be added to the EFSA Database of External Scientific Experts.

Independence and declarations of commitment and interest

The external experts of the Scientific Committee are appointed on a personal basis. They are required to fill in a declaration of interests which may be deemed to be prejudicial to their independence. The declaration of interest of the selected external experts will be published on the EFSA website.

Equal opportunity

EFSA is an equal opportunities employer and takes care to avoid any form of discrimination.

Submission of expression of interests

Candidates are requested to submit their expression of interest together with the declaration of interests electronically through the EFSA's website:

http://www.efsa.europa.eu/EFSA/header/efsa_locale-1178620753812_Jobs.htm

The forms can also be downloaded from the website and sent by registered mail to the following address:

Expression of interests delivered via email will not be accepted. An expression of interest will be deemed admissible only if duly completed. Candidates are kindly invited to fill in the form in English in order to facilitate the selection procedure.

Please note that EFSA will not return expression of interests to candidates. The personal information EFSA requests from candidates will be processed in line with Regulation (EC) No 45/2001 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 18 December 2000 on the protection of individuals with regard to the processing of personal data by the Community institutions and bodies and on the free movement of such data. The purpose of processing of the personal data candidates submit is to manage expression of interests in view of a possible pre-selection and selection at EFSA.

Closing date for sending expression of interests

Expression of interests must be submitted no later than 1 June 2008 at midnight (Local time, GMT +1). For those sent by registered mail, the postmark date will serve as a proof.

Note:

In the event of inconsistency or discrepancy between the English version and any of the other linguistic versions of this publication, the English language version shall prevail.