Ep. 076 - How to Be A Food Lawyer with Cesare Varallo, Independent Food Lawyer and owner at foodlawlatest.com

Jul 24, 2017

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Food Law is one of those topics I fell asleep at in college. But it wasn’t until working in the industry did I find just how important it really is.

If you’ve been a fan of this podcast, you might have heard my frustrations learning about how the Europeans deal with GMOs. If you’re a first time listener, I’ll talk about it again.

But Ceasare Varallo is the man when it comes to making me excited about food law. He’s a lawyer in Italy who focuses on such things as food fraud, regulatory compliance, and communicating crises.

This is an amazing interview all about being a food lawyer. You’ll learn how to get a job in regulatory, how to get people to trust you as an expert and the amazing food technologies Cesare’s really into. One in particular that I haven’t heard of until recently… block chain technology

Sponsor

This episode is sponsored by FoodGrads, an interactive platform for the Food & Beverage Industry, which focuses on closing the gap between students and employers with a broader mission to attract and retain people to a meaningful career in food. From Food Scientists to Farmers, Chefs to Plant Managers, QA Technicians to Dieticians, or Marketing and Sales, no matter what your passion--there's something for everyone in Food—and they will help you find it.

Join FoodGrads for support, mentorship and guidance to start your career. Just go to foodgrads.com

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I am also inviting you to sign up on our email list at myfoodjobrocks.com. I am doing this new thing called the 5 course meal where I send you 5 pieces of hand picked content and deliver it every Friday morning. Like a meal kit…

If you have any questions or suggestions on how to improve the podcast, don’t be afraid to email me at podcast@myfoodjobrocks.com

Knowledge Bombs

Ceasare’s work is three fold: food safety, regulatory, and managing communication
How Ceasare found his niche in food law
Why regulatory is getting more and more important
The interesting things about food marketing
How to learn more about food regulatory

Question Summary

Introduction in a sentence or less?: I’m a food lawyer. I help food companies to reach the compliance Cesare started with commodities at first and then went to more complicated things later Steps it took to get to where you are today: Criminal lawyer, switched law firm and found food clients. Noticed about the specific type of advice Foodlawlatest.com

Blogging advice If you have good content, it will be successful Avoid scandal or “fake news”, give useful facts Interacting with your audience is super important

What’s the most important skill you need for your job?: How you communicate and interact with people How do you get people to trust you more?: A blog with good content is a sign of trust, facts are a sign of trust, showing that you really know what you’re talking about. Keep on delivering good content and make them comfortable.The customer today is much more informed Customers are reading more food labels and are willing to spend good, safe, tasty and authentic food. Food Technology: Smart Agriculture, Drones, Artificial Intelligence to spot food safety issues, block chains, Block Chain: Technology used to secure the financial transactions: bitcoins/ cryptocurrency. Will help food fraud a lot. Biggest Challenge the food industry needs to face: Fraudulence and trust. Big companies are not trusted. Local is more trusted. A small minority has a lot of power What is something you would like to know more about?: Marketing. How much work it takes to do marketing campaigns. How do you make things Viral? Favorite Book: Lord of the Rings Favorite Quote: Winston Churchill: success consists of going from failure to failure without losing enthusiasm Favorite Kitchen Item: My favorite dish is risotto so I like a really big wooden spoon

If anyone wanted a job in regulatory, what should they study on their own?: You can find many courses in food law in United States. California and New York has plenty Study the objective official source depending on countries. Common websites. FDA website, Code of Federal Regulations Not so simple in Europe: 26 countries with deviations Independent blogs can work too

Advice getting into the food regulatory industry: Get your hands dirty. You can’t imagine the complexity with regulatory issues. It’s more about how you approach the problem Where can we find you?: Foodlawlatest@gmail.com