INTRODUCTIONS

The 1996 Annual Meeting of the Society for Risk Analysis-Europe

It is my pleasure to introduce this volume of abstracts for the 1996 Annual Conference of the Society for Risk Analysis - Europe. A number of important tensions in European risk perception, assessment, communication and management make this event and this volume particularly topical and I am delighted that the United Kingdom is at last able to host what has now become an important focus of public, industrial, academic and governmental interest.

This volume represents the breadth and depth of the Society's interests and audiences. You should be aware that the SRA's purpose is to foster and promote:

• Knowledge and understanding of risk analysis techniques and applications;
• Communication and interaction among individuals engaged in risk analysis;
• Application of risk analysis and risk management techniques to the hazards and risks to which individuals and populations are exposed;
• Dissemination of risk analysis information and concepts to all interested individuals;
• Advancement of the state-of-the-art in all aspects of risk analysis;
• Integration and interaction of the various disciplines involved in risk analysis.

Within Europe, this purpose has been pursued in recent years through a successful series of conferences organised on behalf of the European Section of the SRA. This volume reflects this year's attention to the challenging themes "Food, Technology, and Risk," "Industrial Risk and Insurance," "Risk Communication," and "New Trends in Risk Management," and I believe that here is the basis for yet another highly successful conference.

On behalf of the Executive Committee of the Society for Risk Analysis - Europe, I should like to thank the Centre for Environmental Strategy at the University of Surrey for compiling this volume and for organisms the conference. I commend the volume to you and trust that it stimulates you to participate fully in the conference and to join us in pursuit of the Society's increasingly relevant and challenging future.

Dr. Ray Kemp
President,
Society for Risk Analysis - Europe

The University of Surrey is delighted to host the 1996 Annual Meeting of the Society for Risk Analysis-Europe. It is of particular importance to the University's Centre for Environmental Strategy, a cross-disciplinary research and teaching initiative, which is organisms the conference.

The Centre's key mission lies in developing a new intellectual environmental agenda through sympathetic but critical debate between individuals from different academic perspectives. Among the Centre's current research activities are life cycle methodologies, risk issues, and sustainability and resource economics. This work involves hers with obverse backgrounds, including engineering, sociology, geography, law, psychology, mathematics, philosophy and physics.

Within the Centre, a Risk Research Group was established in 1995 to provide a focus for a number of strands of research both basic and applied, broadly concerned with the management of risks by public and private sector organisations. The Group has associated with it an international network of researchers and practitioners.

Research by members of the Group is largely motivated by problems in environmental management and associated corporate decision-making. The work is interdisciplinary in nature, drawing on a wide range of scholarly knowledge and on links with practitioners m many areas of public and business life. Research interests include planning and decision-making in organisational risk management risk perception and communication environmental regulation, valuation problems, risk assessment practices and insurance.

Dr. Ragnar Löfstedt
Conference Director

14 May 1996