Supply Chain Safety

This specialisation focuses on the supply chain for foods and ingredients and the factors that play a role in the safety during transport. This specialisation includes courses as Global Food Security and Risk Management in Supply Chains.

Academic year, study load and course names and codes

The Academic Year of Wageningen University consists of 6 periods from 4-8 weeks (6 or 12 credits per period). In one study year you are assumed to take 60 credits (European Credits or ECTS). In period 1, 2 and 5 two subjects are taught, generally one in the morning and one in the afternoon. These periods consist of 6 weeks of teaching, followed by one week of self study and one week of exams. Period 3 and 4 are shorter, 4 weeks long, and in these weeks one course is taught blockwise (courses are scheduled whole day, in the morning and in the afternoon) and fulltime. In week 4 the course exam is scheduled. Period 6 consists of 9 weeks, due to many national holidays in the spring. In this period all MFS students follow the full-time course Food Safety Managemnet of 12 credits.

Every course has besides its name a code. The code: AAA-xyyzz, with AAA the teaching group ('department') responsible for the course (for example FCH=Food Chemistry, FHM=Food Microbiology), x indicates the level of the course (1=basic, 2=intermediate, 3=advanced), yy is an arbitrary number, zz indicates the number of credits in ECTS.

The table below shows the specialization programme and courses. The course content can be found in the on-line study handbook.


First year

This specialisation has more optional courses as the other specialisations. This is due to the variety of departments where you can do your thesis: Food Microbiology (FHM), Law (LAW), Business Economics (BEC) or Operational Research and Logistics (ORL). The optional courses are thus targeted to a thesis and clustered as thesis track courses (TT). In the beginning of your study depending on the topic of you interest in the second year, you will have to choose optional courses as a thesis track.


Course Type Period and Time*
Compulsory courses (CS):
LAW-22806 Food Law CS 2M
FHM-61312 Food Safety Management CS 6WD
PPS-31306 Global Food Security CS 2A
BEC-31806 Risk Management in Food Supply Chains CS 4WD
Restricted optional 1 (RO1):
BEC-21306 Food Safety Economics RO1 5A
ORL-31806 Food Logistics Management RO1 5A
*M=Morning course, A=Afternoon course, WD=Whole day course, scheduled in the morning and in the afternoon.


Second year

The second year consists of an individual thesis project (6 months; 36 ECTS) and an internship/traineeship (at least for 4 months; 24 ECTS). The topics of the thesis and internship will be related to the specialisation.

The thesis is carried out at Wageningen University. Thesis topics in this specialisation are offered by the following groups:

The internship is always done outside Wageningen University and can be performed in food industry, research institute or university. The internship can be done in the Netherlands or any other country. The internship is not related to the thesis, but it has to be a food safety related topic and in the field of specialisation.