International Food Safety and the U.S.
Published on March 18, 2002

Overview

It is impossible to check every steak or chicken to ensure it is safe. Good hygienic practices must be followed throughout the production process, just as a chef works in a hygienic way from the beginning to the end and does not only rely on cooking to make the food safe. Therefore, on a national or an international scale, a holistic approach to food safety, which pays attention to the whole process of food production, from animal nutrition, veterinary drugs, and slaughter to further product processing, is necessary to ensure food safety.

Under the SPS Agreement (Sanitary and Phyto-Sanitary), every country has the right to set its own appropriate level of sanitary or phyto-sanitary food safety protection. Different nations' food safety standards vary greatly. The United States has the oldest legislation on food safety and hygiene. The European Union's sanitary standards, today, are patterned after those in the United States. They were applied in Europe at the request of US inspectors some 20 years ago. Apart from retaining the right to set national food safety standards, countries also retain the right to regulate food safety standards of imports.

An importing country has the right to decide whether a food regulatory system employed by an exporting country is equivalent to its own or is adequate to achieve the importing country's appropriate level of sanitary or phyto-sanitary protection. Foreign countries that export meat, poultry, and egg products to the United States, the European Union, and other developed nations are required to establish and maintain inspection systems that are equivalent to those in the importing nation.

Determining whether an importing nation is equivalent or not, is not simply a process of comparing end-product specifications. Rather, it is the holistic assessment of the overall production hygiene and an evaluation of the exporter's ability to deliver an effective inspection system. This requires an assessment on how the legislative, executive, and judicial systems of the exporter's nation work to regulate and ensure food safety standards.

A Brief History of International Food Safety Regulations

In 1948, national food safety, animal and plant health measures, which affected trade, were covered under GATT rules. Article I of the GATT, the most-favored nation (MFN) clause, required non-discriminatory treatment of imported products from different foreign suppliers, and Article III required that such products be treated no less favorably than domestically produced goods with respect to any laws or requirements affecting their sale. This provision allowed countries to take measures "necessary to protect human, animal or plant life or health," as long as these did not unjustifiably discriminate between countries where the same conditions prevailed and were not used as a disguise to restrict trade.

Later in 1979, under the Agreement on Technical Barriers to Trade (TBT), sanitary and phyto-sanitary measures were covered under the technical requirements resulting from food safety and animal and plant health measures, including pesticide residue limits, inspection requirements, and labeling. The TBT also laid out the guidelines for settling trade disputes arising from use of food safety and other technical restrictions. However, there was a need for a specific agreement on sanitary and phyto-sanitary (SPS) measures.

Under the WTO, in 1994, an agreement on sanitary and phyto-sanitary measures was agreed upon. The SPS agreement sets clearer and more detailed rights and obligations for food safety and animal and plant health measures, which affect trade. The agreement gives more flexibility to individual countries to set and enforce safety requirements that are crucial to protecting human, animal, or plant health, on the basis of scientific information. In addition, the agreement requires an obligation from every nation for non-discrimination, advance notification of proposed measures, and the creation of information offices ("Enquiry Points"). It is with the hope that these measures would promote transparency in international food and commodities trade.

Food Safety in the United States of America

In the United States, an estimated 76 million illnesses, 325,00 hospitalizations and 5,000 deaths occur each year as a result of food-born illness. Although there are many opportunities for contamination to occur and many opportunities for contaminations to be checked, the U.S. government is determined to bring these numbers down. Therefore, the government created the Healthy People Initiative, which targets to reduce the occurrence of food-born illnesses by fifty percent before 2010.

In order to meet these health objectives, in 1997, the U.S. government created the Food Safety Initiative, a framework that encompassed surveillance, outbreak response, and risk assessment, voluntary and regulatory approaches, such as inspections, research and education, with regards to pathogens.

In 1998, the U.S. government created the Council on Food Safety, which formulated strategic plans for federal food safety activities. This council addressed all hazards, not only pathogens.

The United States government believes that decision-making should be transparent and should involve all interested parties. All federal agencies work closely with other government agencies that share food safety responsibilities. The United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), the Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) and the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) are responsible for the implementation of food safety laws. Meanwhile, the Congress enacts statutes designed to ensure the safety of the food supply and establishes the nation's level of protection when the judicial system acts as a forum for consumers' complaints and agency-initiated enforcement actions.

The United States government feels the need to assure consumers that their food is safe regardless of whether it is produced domestically or imported. Therefore, the government only permits imports of foods from countries that operate under equivalent food safety regulations. This is why countries leaders must work towards implementing harmonized food safety laws.

Recently, the United States implemented the USDA's Pathogen Reduction and HACCP (PR/HACCP) rule for meat and poultry products. Domestically, the United States has implemented PR/HACCP in all plants. Internationally, Food Safety Inspection Service (FSIS), a department under the USDA, has completed its equivalency determinations to ensure that countries eligible to export to the United States have equivalent systems in place. The USDA is a leader in applying the concept of equivalence, and FSIS continues to audit and inspect to remain confident that exporting countries have implemented equivalent systems. Below is an outline of the U.S. food safety regulating system.

U.S. Food Safety and Thailand

Thailand has been awaiting authorization to export meat and poultry products to the Untied States for the last decade. Although Thailand's poultry producing factories are equipped with state-of-the-art technologies and HACCP certification, they have yet to be approved for exporting to the U.S. It is not the quality of individual factories, however, that the United States is concerned. As mentioned above, the United States demands an executive, legislative, and judicial body that is equivalent with the one the US currently works under, one that oversees and regulates national food safety standards. In the second and final part of our Food Safety series, we would discuss Thailand's existing food safety framework.

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