Brussels, 08/04/2002 (Agence Europe) - The European Commission has opened selection procedure for the 15 members of the Management Board of the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA). On Monday it published a short-list of 30 candidates from Member States. The Council and the Parliament are to choose 14 members of the Management Board from the list, in order to ensure the highest level of competence, a broad range of expertise and as broad a geographical repartition as possible. The Commission will itself appoint the 15th member as its own representative on the Board. The Management Board and the EFSA Executive Director are expected to take up their duties in Brussels (provisional location for the EFSA headquarters) during the summer and early autumn.
Pursuant to the regulation dated 28 January (establishing the principles of food legislation and establishing EFSA), the 14 members of the Management Board are appointed by the Council in consultation with the Parliament (the latter has a maximum time of three months in which to examine the short-list and to make its opinion known to the Council). We would make it clear that 4 of the members selected must have experience in consumer representative organisations and other interest groups in the food chain. The term of office of each member of the Management Board will be four years and may be renewed once, except for the first term of office lasting six years for half of the members.
We recall that the EFSA Executive Director will be appointed by the Management Board for a period of five years renewable, on the basis of another list of candidates proposed by the Commission after a call for expression of interest appears in the OJ (see EUROPE of 1 March, p.16). After being chosen, the candidate selected by the Management Board should make a declaration before the European Parliament.