Food Safety - The Oxford Topic of Food, Politics, and Society - page 585

Chapter 24
Food Safety
Bruce M. Chassy
Introduction: Food Safety
If one were to ask consumers what their expectations are about food safety, it is likely
that 100 percent of them would respond that they expect the food they eat to be safe.
An expert would immediately counter that achieving absolute food safety is impossible
and that ensuring the safety of any food is a highly complex and technical challenge.
A quick glance at the table of contents of a textbook of food science or food technol-
ogy will reveal that food safety is indeed a complex and multifaceted subject (Vaclavik
and Christian, 2007; Campbell-Platt, 2009). The raw ingredients of foods are usually
produced on farms—an environment that is far from sterile and pathogen free. In devel-
oped countries, food ingredients are exposed to numerous hazards as they navigate
from farms through a complex processing, manufacturing, warehousing, transporta-
tion and retailing system; the food systems of less developed countries may or may not
be less complex; however, data show that they are also less safe.
Since a safe supply of food is an essential ingredient for a smoothly functioning soci-
ety, most countries have elaborated food safety laws and regulations intended to ensure
that the food that consumers purchase is reasonably safe; regional and local laws often
supplement federal regulations. These laws and regulations often define the composi-
tion of products, set rules for safe food processing and packaging, specify safety systems
and checks that must be in place, provide rules on record-keeping and traceability—
important should food need to be recalled—and define standards or limits for micro-
bial, chemical, and incidental contaminants and myriad other detailed requirements
necessary to ensure safety, quality and wholesomeness. Since the system is not perfect,1
provisions for adverse incident reporting and tracking, and incident investigation and
mitigation, including food recalls, are an essential part of the food safety system.
Although most consumers are aware of food-borne illness as a result of widespread
media coverage of food-borne disease outbreaks, there are many misconceptions about
food safety. For instance, although awareness of food-borne outbreaks is high, some