DEFENSEFOOD stärkt Europas Lebensmittelkette gegen CBR-Bedrohungen

1 März 2026

Prof. Dr. Gertrud Buchenrieder, Institut für Soziologie und Volkswirtschaftslehre, und Prof. Dr. Eva Herschinger, Institut für Politikwissenschaft an der Fakultät für Staats- und Sozialwissenschaften haben mit dem Forschungszentrum RISK und dem Forschungsinstitut CISS das Projekt „DEFENSEFOOD“ bei der Europäischen Kommission eingeworben.

Laufzeit: 01.10.2025 - 30.09.2029

Förderung: Europäischen Kommission - Horizon Europe

The DEFENSEFOOD project aims to enhance the resilience of the EU food supply chain against chemical, biological, and radiological (CBR) threats, ensuring robust preparedness, rapid response, and effective recovery. This comprehensive approach addresses critical areas of threat management, fostering cross-border collaboration, technological innovation, and capacity building to protect public health, bolster economic stability, and secure food systems.

Food safety and security are critical pillars for maintaining public health, economic stability, and societal resilience. The intentional, i.e. terrorist or criminal, contamination of the food supply chain by chemical, biological, and radiological (CBR) agents poses significant risks to both human health and the economy. As highlighted by the World Health Organization (WHO), such acts of terrorism and (un)intentional food systems contaminations are among the primary global public health threats of the 21st century. In Europe, while having one of the highest food chain safety standards in the world, ensuring the safety of the food chain from agricultural production to consumption remains a priority for sustainable food systems, disaster resilience, and critical infrastructure protection.

The increasing threat of food contamination incidents, as evidenced by past crises involving dioxin or fipronil contaminations, Transmissible Spongiform Encephalopathy (TSE), and other zoonotic outbreaks, and suggested by important environmental, geopolitical and socio-economic changes, underscores the urgent need to further develop a resilient, adaptable food chain that can rapidly detect, mitigate, and recover from such shocks. As terrorists have shown in the past that they are willing to use CBR agents to carry out attacks (the 1995 attacks in Japan using chemical and biological weapons or the anthrax letters after 9/11 being prominent cases in point), there has been heightened concern about terrorist actors targeting the food supply chain with CBR agents. While no major terrorist attacks with these agents have been documented so far, several agencies, like the United States Department of Homeland Security, have noted the vulnerability of the food supply chain to terrorism, considered it as a critical infrastructure and developed programs to protect the chain . Furthermore, there are important challenges linked to the current situation in Europe with the Russian war against Ukraine. The latter emphasizes that intentional food threats not only stem from non-state actors but also from state actors with the use of CBR agents to attack the food system being part of a hybrid warfare strategy . Also, threats resulting as collateral damage of war activities might have significance, e.g. releases of heavy metals or increased risks of radiological contamination.