Future career - MSc Food Safety

The programme is aimed to provide the market with graduates that can work as a food safety specialist in the food industry, governmental organisations, product associations or federations, food inspection services or similar, research institutes or specialized law agencies. We have a list of career opportunities below, so if you want to know what kind of jobs you could get with this programme, keep reading.

After graduation

The actual position depends highly on the interest of the graduate, as well as the specialisation within the programme (microbiology, toxicology, law, allergies).

Based on the jobs of alumni it can be stated that the vast majority of the graduates works in one of the intended fields and organisations. As the unemployment rate is extremely low, there are no indications of a shortage of jobs.

Differences between specialications

Graduates from Specialisation A (Applied Food Safety) are more employed in industry, universities and research institutes, whereas graduates of Specialisation B (Food Safety Law) are more employed in the legal departments (regulatory affairs) in the food industry, the food inspection services or in governmental organisations. Specialisation C (Supply Chain Safety) is mainly industry oriented.

The table below provides some examples on the type of jobs of recent graduates:

Function(s) Company or institute
Senior Food Research Officer Department of Food Technology and Quality Control, Government of Nepal
Postdoctoral researcher Dublin Institute of Technology
Consultant Kwaliteitsmanager at La Place restaurants, the Netherlands
PhD Student IATA, Valencia, Spain
Food Safety officer WHO Western Pacific Regional Office, Manila, Philippines
Technical Services Change Manager Continental Europe HJ Heinz, the Netherlands
Researcher Research Center for Marine and Fisheries Product Processing and Biotechnology Indonesia
Regulatory Affairs manager Yakult Europe
Post market surveillance officer of food products Tanzania Food and Drugs Authority (TFDA)
Industry project management Agrisource Co., Ltd. Thailand
Professional specialist Princeton University, Greater New York City Area
PhD Student Department of Food, Bioprocessing and Nutrition Sciences, North Carolina State University
Government regulatory affairs officer FDA Philippines
PhD Student University of Western Ontario, Canada
Microbiologist PURAC BV, the Netherlands
Food microbiologist Micreos, Wageningen, the Netherlands
Junior researcher RIKILT - Institute of Food Safety, Wageningen, the Netherlands
PhD student PhD student at Nestlé Switzerland
Formulation Coordinator in QD department Mead Johnson Nutrition, Nijmegen, the Netherlands
Management Trainee Nestlé R&D Beijing
Microbiologist DSM Food Specialties
QA manager Lamex Foods, Inc