FSA Chief Scientist Blog
URL
CASE STUDY OWNER
Food Standards Agency (FSA)
LESSONS LEARNT
Strengths
- The purpose of this blog was clear to those managing and using it;
- The author of the blog made regular, detailed and diverse entries (appropriate to the scope of his agency and his specific role within it);
- The author frequently responded to user comments;
- The author frequently linked to external sites in blog entries;
- The design and tone of the blog was appropriate to a general audience, followed Agency guidelines, but was also unique;
- The Agency experimented with tag clouds to aid navigation;
- The communications and policy teams in the FSA provided a consistent level of support to the author;
- The blog had a prominent link from the FSA corporate website.
Potential for improvement
- Entries could have been more responsive to public interest generated by media coverage;
- Blog could have made greater use of rich media (photos, audio and video) to reduce dependency on text;
- The link between the blog (and discussions it generated) to policy making was unclear;
- Blog should have made more effort to locate and link to other relevant sites, communities and resources online.
OVERVIEW
The FSA is an independent government agency. It provides advice and information to the public and government on food safety, nutrition and diet. It also aims to protect consumers through effective enforcement and monitoring of food hygiene.
POLICY PURPOSE
The blog coincided with the appointment of Andrew Wadge to the role of Chief Scientist at the FSA. The purpose of the blog is to:
- Provide an unmediated form of public engagement and to raise the public profile of the role of the Chief Scientist;
- Promote the role of science in food standards, explaining how the Agency uses it to inform its policies and advice.
Themes covered in the blog were categorised as follows:
- Food fraud;
- Out and about;
- Science, safety and health;
- Science in government;
- Supporting consumer choice.
The blog is not tied to a specific consultation but is used to mark several initiatives: the first seeks to increase the amount of folic acid in food; the second is a consultation on official meat controls. Finally, the blog brings to its readers’ attention to the FSA’s strategy on fats and sugars.
Policy discussions relate to the UK. However, access and commenting is not restricted to the UK.
MODEL
Weblog (third-party build, design and hosting).
The blog is public and anyone can comment on entries contained in it, though name, email and acknowledgement of the terms and conditions are required.
Reader comments are pre-moderated against the terms and conditions (published on the blog). Comment moderation is carried out by FSA’s communications team.
DURATION
The blog launched on November 20, 2006, and is ongoing.
PUBLICITY
The blog is marketed on the Agency’s corporate website and press releases were sent to the national and trade media to coincide with its launch.
OTHER METHODS
Public and stakeholder perspectives on policy areas (referenced in the blog) are regularly solicited. Submissions are invited via email or letter.
USER PROFILES
No demographic data has been collected.
Respondents (n=39) reported having regular access to the internet from a range of places.
The majority (85%) of those visiting and commenting on this blog did not have a blog or website of their own. Users were interested in blogs generally, but were not inclined to visit policy-related blogs.
In terms of prior political engagement, 44% of our respondents had been in contact with their MP prior to taking part in the blog; 54% had not (2% did not say). Meanwhile, 10% had given evidence to a parliamentary inquiry previously; 12% of participants had taken part in government consultations.
These figures suggest that while respondents were politically engaged and efficacious (the majority believed that they would be heard and that they could make a difference – 51% and 49% respectively), they were not used to engaging formally with Parliament or government – particularly online.
USAGE TRENDS
In terms of blog traffic, there was a far higher rate of visits to the site than there were posts:
The blog’s appeal seems closely linked to media coverage of policy areas and food related issues. For example, the peak in traffic (January 2007) corresponds with the well publicised launch of the FSA’s initiative to provide ‘traffic light’ labelling on food. The interest in the blog continued in February, during the ‘bird flu’ outbreak, and picked up again following an entry on food additives and children’s additives after the collation of our evaluation surveys.
USER FEEDBACK
In their feedback, users said they had learnt about the work of the FSA from the blog, and felt that it explained policy areas and processes. User feedback responses are illustrated as percentages below:
While users claimed to be motivated by the desire to influence policy, they were aware that the primary function of the blog was less to capture public opinion and more to disseminate information and explain processes.
A significant number of users reported visiting the blog on a weekly basis. Their interest was stimulated by the regular entries made by the Chief Scientist on a range of subjects; the fact that he also responded to comments from readers was appreciated by participants. Of the 30 comments posted, 13 were made by Andrew Wadge (in addition to the 32 entries he had made by the time the evaluation period closed). However, users also said that the blog would have benefited from comments from other visitors.
Survey respondents were asked to rate the blog in comparison to other blogs they had visited (with 5 being the highest rating and 1 being the lowest). The majority of our respondents gave the blog an above average rating (although almost half did not provide a score):
DETAILED FEEDBACK
This case study demonstrates how a blog can be used to distribute information and solicit public feedback on a manageable, ongoing basis. Blogging is often associated with ‘personality’, and the FSA tapped into this in an effective manner to promote the profile of their Chief Scientist. Andrew Wadge is confident about explaining food science to general and specialist audiences, which proved an important factor in the blog’s positive reception. Nevertheless, while blogs are often text-based, the applications can handle rich media content. In the case of the Chief Scientist blog, using audio and video clips may have been a more effective means of explaining complexity or detail.
As a community of interest builds around the blog over time, the FSA may consider bringing more formal consultative elements directly onto the blog as a means of tapping into the apparent interest on the part of many users to provide feedback on policies. That a clear link to many policy decisions was not available disappointed some of the blog’s early users.
There may also be the potential to segment the audience by providing a range of blogs – some for a general audience and others for particular stakeholder groups. Such an approach may help to satisfy those who came to the FSA blog looking for answers to specific questions about food safety. Although this information was often provided on the Agency’s corporate website, these users preferred to ask a direct question to a ‘real life’ expert.
FOLLOW UP
The FSA is still running the Chief Scientist blog. The Agency is monitoring emerging technologies for their consultation and engagement potential.
