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HACCP
- Does Cost Outweigh Benefit ?
Story + Photos
By Sally Subhapholsiri
Tokyo, Japan
No, design and implementation do not come
cheap; but yes, they are worth the cost, according to experts from the US, Japan,
France and Norway who spoke during the HACCP International Symposium for Seafood held concurrent to the 2nd
Japan International Seafood & Technology Expo 2000. Colleen
Coyne-Boragine, Executive Vice-President of the American
Seafood Institute (ASI), quoted a US study by Dr. Ken Gall
which was conducted under the New York Sea Grant Extension
Program. The results of the survey, published in May, 2000,
showed that the majority of the respondents
view HACCP as beneficial inspite of the high cost.
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The biggest benefit for industry, according
to Ms. Coyne-Boragine is that “HACCP has helped
to create a level playing field “. After HACCP became mandatory
in 1997, the USFDA started the first round of inspections
of the 4,100 seafood processors nationwide.
A third (1,200 establishments) were found to have
acceptable HACCP plans while 4% were judged to have significant
deficiencies and were closed. The industry has, since then, put in time,
effort and money, on an equal basis, to comply with the law, she said.
Randy Rice, Seafood Technical Program Director
of the Alaska Seafood Marketing Institute (ASMI) echoed the
gains to industry but added that regulators also benefit from
the standardization HACCP brings. Mr. Rice emphasized the value
of ongoing training and education. Currently, producers pay
the bulk of HACCP costs but have yet to “balance the cost of
incremental hazard reduction against risk”, he said. Mr. Rice
added that 70% of rejections worldwide are for non-safety reasons
and training could help reduce that level. By the same token,
“education increases the ability of the consumer to recognize
safe seafood and may influence him to bear part of the cost,”
he said.
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Juiichi Fujita from the Japanese Fisheries
Ministry called seafood “Japan’s treasure” and HACCP a “guarantee
system” for its safety and quality. Naoki Takatori from the
Japan Fisheries Association (JFA) confirmed, in a separate
interview, efforts
within the seafood industry to comply with HACCP. However, due to insufficienct resources, JFA has so far assessed
only 100 companies out of 15,000, he said. Henry L’Oreal from IFREMER , spoke of government assistance
for SMEs in France. IFREMER is a technical organization created
to advise the French government and industry. Dr. Sverre Ola
Roald, Norway’s Regional Director for Fisheries and Aquaculture,
presented the structure of the Norwegian
“own checks” system. Althrough the papers from France
and Norway did not come up with statistics on cost or responses
from processors like
in the US study, both spoke of benefits for the industry in
terms of harmonization within the EU regulatory bodies as
well as improvement of practices and controls for industry.
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