As our diets turn global, extra attention needs to be paid to food safety
To be blunt, the premise of this monthly column is a moot point if the food we eat makes us sick. Granted, the issue of food safety is broad and nuanced. And one of the underlying principles of the food movement is food that is healthy, which by definition would be safe. But while one could argue that the recent E. coli outbreak in Germany is an isolated incident, stringing together all so-called
isolated incidents over the last few years leads to the conclusion that we’ve got a serious problem that needs to be addressed.
That any person should be afraid of their food is the very antithesis of what we consider the genuine article, to say nothing of the Slow Food mantra of good, clean and fair. To some degree the food movement itself has played a role in this new concern by opening the door to more locally grown and processed products, and new, flourishing food businesses—takeout, catering, mobile food trucks, et cetera—that require new awareness by the purveyor and consumer of how to prepare, store and transport food. But those should be things we can deal with. And there has been an increase in safety attention at the local level. But the food supply has gotten even more global (further evidence of the wisdom of buying local), and that poses additional challenges.
The issues are complicated. In a down economy food businesses may, with the best of intentions, look to cut costs—especially labor expenses. But adequate sanitation and proper heating and cooling decisions require personnel. So do inspections. And investigations. Barbara Kowalcyk, director of food safety at the Center for Foodborne Illness, recently wrote a column titled “Welcome to Armchair Epidemiology: The How-Tos of Solving a Foodborne Illness Outbreak.” In it she writes, “Investigating foodborne illness is a really tough thing to do. It takes a lot of time, rarely follows a linear path and often is unsuccessful.”
She says people typically think what made them sick is the last thing they ate when most likely it’s something they ate several days before. For example, E. coli usually takes three to ten days for symptoms to appear. And as we suggested earlier, as diets expand to include more foods from both global markets and multiple local growers and producers, how do we keep track of it all?
August 19th, 2011 at 5:51 pm
Quality is every body job not always quality concerned person.
August 19th, 2011 at 8:45 pm
It isn’t all that complicated. The food industry has not, as an industry, faced the fact that we do not have “the safest food in the world”. When each member in the food supply chain begins to act responsibly and work to cooperatively implement food safety as a basic business requirement, systems will evolve and we will have safe food.
That may be a shock to many businesses (small farms think they are immune) but if they have to go out of business because they refuse to take responsibility, then they should go out of business or be forced out of business.
August 20th, 2011 at 8:58 am
Our food in general is very safe. After all food scares and illness are still news worthy. Not the case if these were common place. Of course both mistakes and producers not dedicated to food safety will blunt the industry’s image and credability but these are both rare. In the case the frozen food probably even safer with its pathogenic growth not an issue.
August 20th, 2011 at 8:59 am
There are so many rules and regulations that are not enforced in our industry. It starts at the top, however it starts from the bottom up in the cafe’s, restaurants and public level of the consumer.By this, I mean to say; production plants have systems in place, supervisors, QC teams, correct and we still have violations, mistakes and accidents. From the street level sidewalk cafe to the street vendor to the finest restaurants in the world, we do not have enough direction to follow through in all the procedures, safety and sanitation regulations.We do not have enough inspectors to help operators enforce the rules and regulations. Top level management, supervisors, chefs and kitchen managers need supervision. All go though the initial required training and need to stay up on enforcing their staff following the rules for the above mentioned.
August 20th, 2011 at 8:59 am
Foodborne Illness outbrakes are not by any means isolated, We have many on going investigations with Tainted Turkey with Salmonella, Tainted Strawberries with e-coli, and a others. A good place to start is Industry Management and Employee training.
August 20th, 2011 at 8:59 am
You have raised some good points. Indeed …”we’ve got a serious problem that needs to be addressed.” You may want to join the conversation at GCSE-Food & Health Protection:
August 20th, 2011 at 9:45 am
Quality should be the measure of everything done by everybody.
August 20th, 2011 at 10:42 pm
Our food supply, is constatntly at risk in day to day handling alone, air borne diseases, distributution and handling make it more at risk.
In the event of an outbreak, know where it came from, but more importantly historic and movement traceability helps save money too all involved and potetnially save lives.
August 20th, 2011 at 11:51 pm
You seem to be very biased on letting actual comments on this article, not a good thing to do just saying…
August 21st, 2011 at 7:37 am
Our food supply, is constatntly at risk in day to day handling alone, air borne diseases, distributution and handling make it more at risk.
August 21st, 2011 at 7:38 am
I agree it is not a good approach. Supporting a strong systematic HACCP-based approach to risk reduction can certainly be more effective than the impact of declaring a bug illegal. We will probably always have illness outbreaks.
August 23rd, 2011 at 4:22 pm
Food Safety must be our measure and focus… anything providing quality without safety is a waste. Once safety is as secure as possible, then whatever we do for quality would be our next yardstick
August 24th, 2011 at 3:02 pm
Of course one must remain vigilant with regards emerging and existing threats to food but I would have thought that
August 24th, 2011 at 6:54 pm
Food wherever it is produced can cause problems but I would have thought that some of the issues in Europe pale into insignificance when compared to the overall general situation in India.
Most of the European Issues are caused by the forced demands of Capitalism or adaptive organisms taking advantage of new food trends/crossover/ antibiotic abuse/so forth