Ultra-processed foods: A One Health agenda for action and accountability

One Health Summit: Virtual webinar as part of the One Health Festival. Spanish translation available.

Overview and proposed agenda

industrial products, now known as uInternally processed foods (UPFs) are becoming increasingly dominant in global food markets and supply chains. These products are typically industrially formulated from refined raw materials and additives, produced through multiple processing steps, and distributed through complex global supply chains. Its rapid expansion has changed food environments and dietary patterns around the world.

UPF is widely discussed in relation to diet-related non-communicable diseases. However, its production, formulation, and distribution are embedded within a broader industrial food system that intersects with multiple areas of public policy, including agriculture, food safety, environmental sustainability, and global trade. As a result, UPF influences not only dietary exposure patterns but also agricultural production systems, environmental pressures, and foodborne illness governance.

Inspecting ultra-processed foods One health perspective It helps reveal how modern food systems shape interconnected risks across human, animal, and environmental health.

Health threats at the human-animal-environment interface, such as zoonotic diseases, antimicrobial resistance (AMR), food safety incidents, and environmental degradation, are increasing in scale, frequency, and complexity. These risks are transnational, multi-sectoral and systemic in nature and cannot be effectively addressed through individual or sector-specific approaches.

of One Health Approach is widely recognized as an appropriate framework to address these interrelated challenges, as it fosters integrated action across the human, animal, and environmental health sectors.

Despite strong political support, implementation of One Health remains uneven. The missions and expertise of agencies related to human, animal, and environmental health are often dispersed across sectors and organizations, and coordination mechanisms that connect these actors remain limited.

In this context, considering the increasing role of ultra-processed foods in global/modern food systems provides a practical entry point for exploring how the One Health perspective can be operationalized in food system governance.

Purpose of side event

This side event examines the growing role of ultra-processed foods within modern food systems and explores how these products intersect with interrelated risks across human health, animal health, and environmental sustainability.

This session will highlight emerging evidence on exposure to chemicals and substances associated with dietary exposures, environmental and production routes, and ultra-processed food systems through short presentations from experts. We then use a One Health perspective to explore how these interconnected pathways relate to broader food system governance challenges.

Based on this evidence, discussions will consider whether and how food authorities can be involved in the governance of ultra-processed foods through existing regulatory functions such as monitoring food-borne hazards, regulating additives and food-contact materials, traceability and recall systems, and monitoring labeling enforcement and compliance.

Viewing ultra-processed foods from a One Health perspective creates the following dialogue: Policy coherence across nutrition, food safety, agriculture and the environmentand the potential co-benefits of regulatory approaches that address multiple risks simultaneously.

Tentative agenda (90 minutes)

This side event will combine short presentations from experts with a moderated panel discussion to explore how ultra-processed foods intersect with One Health challenges and how food authorities can engage through their existing regulatory capabilities.