12
October 2020

Selvarani Elahi awarded MBE in Queen’s Birthday Honours List 2020

Selvarani Elahi, Deputy Government Chemist and Business Manager, Food Research, LGC, has been awarded an MBE for services to Food Measurement Science in the Queen’s Birthday 2020 Honours List.

Selvarani Elahi, who has been with LGC since 1991, was appointed Deputy UK Government Chemist in 2011, and has over 25 years’ experience in the analysis of food and agriculture samples and works across a variety of policy areas, with different stakeholder groups both nationally and internationally, to improve standards in measurement science.

Ms Elahi, who has been the Chair of Defra’s Food Authenticity Analytical Methods Working Group since 2013 and is also the Executive Director of the Food Authenticity Network, said, “I feel incredibly privileged to receive this great honour for ‘doing my job’, which wouldn’t be possible without support from my many talented colleagues at LGC.”

“I would like to thank the Food Authenticity Network Team (Dr Mark Woolfe, Dr Stephen Ellison, Felicia Golden) and the past & present Advisory Board Chairs (Dr Michael Walker & Sterling Crew) for all their hard work that has resulted in the global growth of the Network.

“Thanks must also go to Professor Chris Elliott and his Review Team for sowing the seeds for the birth of our Network and many other fantastic initiatives such as the National Food Crime Unit, the Scottish Food Crime and Incidents Unit and the Food Industry Intelligence Network, all of which allow the UK to demonstrate leadership in this important area. A final special thanks to my early career managers (Ian Lumley and Dr Peter Farnell) for their guidance and support.”

Michael Walker, Head of the Office of the UK Government Chemist, which is hosted by LGC, said, “I am very pleased that Selvarani’s work has been recognised by this honour. The Food Authenticity Network was a recommendation in the Elliott Review in the wake of the 2013 UK horsemeat episode and is the only one of its kind in the world. It is an open access website bringing together global information on food authenticity testing, food fraud mitigation and food supply chain integrity in one convenient location, and it’s helping to raise standards world-wide so that ultimately,  consumers can have greater confidence in the food they buy.”