Public and private food safety regulatory approaches: exploring the role of global food safety initiative auditors in achieving public health objectives, focusing on the Canadian experience

Governments are faced with a variety of challenging issues that have proven difficult to manage, one of which is providing safe food to its citizens. Recognizing this, and in response to several high-profile food safety crises in the late 1990s, food retailers created the Global Food Safety Initiative (GFSI), a private food safety regulatory approach. Certification to a GFSI-benchmarked private standard is often required through customer-supplier contracts, and as a result, food producers in the global agri-food supply chain may be subject to both the public and a private food safety regulatory approach. This dissertation uses Webb’s (2005) sustainable governance framework, which maintains that public, private, and civil sectors’ institutions, processes, rule instruments and actors have regulatory capabilities in support of public policy objectives, to explore whether or not the GFSI auditor, an actor in the GFSI-system, supports the public heath objectives of the state. Three primary research questions were developed to pursue this inquiry. First, on a functional level, can the GFSI auditor can be considered a public health practitioner analogous to the government’s food safety inspector? Second, do GFSI auditors view themselves as public health practitioners? Third, do other actors in the GFSI-system consider GFSI auditors to be public health practitioners? Using a mixed methods investigative approach, this dissertation presents the following conclusion: though the GFSI auditor can be characterized as a public health practitioner who supports the state’s public health objectives, neither the auditors themselves nor other actors, e.g. representatives of Certification Bodies, Certification Programme Owners, etc., in the GFSIsystem who participated in this research characterize the GFSI auditor as a public health practitioner. The final chapter of this dissertation discusses the public health and policy study significance of this investigation, provides policy recommendations to both the public and private institutions and actors involved governing food safety in Canada intended to strengthen the overall public health system by recognizing the role that GFSI auditors have in promoting public health objectives, and opportunities for further research.

Public and private food safety regulatory approaches: exploring the role of global food safety initiative auditors in achieving public health objectives, focusing on the Canadian experience

Governments are faced with a variety of challenging issues that have proven difficult to manage, one of which is providing safe food to its citizens. Recognizing this, and in response to several high-profile food safety crises in the late 1990s, food retailers created the Global Food Safety Initiative (GFSI), a private food safety regulatory approach. Certification to a GFSI-benchmarked private standard is often required through customer-supplier contracts, and as a result, food producers in the global agri-food supply chain may be subject to both the public and a private food safety regulatory approach. This dissertation uses Webb’s (2005) sustainable governance framework, which maintains that public, private, and civil sectors’ institutions, processes, rule instruments and actors have regulatory capabilities in support of public policy objectives, to explore whether or not the GFSI auditor, an actor in the GFSI-system, supports the public heath objectives of the state. Three primary research questions were developed to pursue this inquiry. First, on a functional level, can the GFSI auditor can be considered a public health practitioner analogous to the government’s food safety inspector? Second, do GFSI auditors view themselves as public health practitioners? Third, do other actors in the GFSI-system consider GFSI auditors to be public health practitioners? Using a mixed methods investigative approach, this dissertation presents the following conclusion: though the GFSI auditor can be characterized as a public health practitioner who supports the state’s public health objectives, neither the auditors themselves nor other actors, e.g. representatives of Certification Bodies, Certification Programme Owners, etc., in the GFSIsystem who participated in this research characterize the GFSI auditor as a public health practitioner. The final chapter of this dissertation discusses the public health and policy study significance of this investigation, provides policy recommendations to both the public and private institutions and actors involved governing food safety in Canada intended to strengthen the overall public health system by recognizing the role that GFSI auditors have in promoting public health objectives, and opportunities for further research.

IFS und GFSI zoffen um Zertifikate

Im Markt für die Auditierung und Zertifizierung von Lebensmittelsicherheit will die Global Food Safety Initiative neue Services aufbauen. Die Standardorganisation IFS Management fürchtet das Entstehen eines Monopols und schaltet das Kartellamt ein. Doch die Wettbewerbshüter winken ab.

Impact of the Global Food Safety Initiative on Food Safety Worldwide: Statistical Analysis of a Survey of International Food Processors

ABSTRACT In 2000, the Consumer Goods Forum established the Global Food Safety Initiative (GFSI) to increase the safety of the world's food supply and to harmonize food safety regulations worldwide. In 2013, a university research team in conjunction with Diversey Consulting (Sealed Air), the Consumer Goods Forum, and officers of GFSI solicited input from more than 15,000 GFSI-certified food producers worldwide to determine whether GFSI certification had lived up to these expectations. A total of 828 usable questionnaires were analyzed, representing about 2,300 food manufacturing facilities and food suppliers in 21 countries, mainly across Western Europe, Australia, New Zealand, and North America. Nearly 90% of these certified suppliers perceived GFSI as being beneficial for addressing their food safety concerns, and respondents were eight times more likely to repeat the certification process knowing what it entailed. Nearly three-quarters (74%) of these food manufacturers would choose to go through the certification process again even if certification were not required by one of their current retail customers. Important drivers for becoming GFSI certified included continuing to do business with an existing customer, starting to do business with new customer, reducing the number of third-party food safety audits, and continuing improvement of their food safety program. Although 50% or fewer respondents stated that they saw actual increases in sales, customers, suppliers, or employees, significantly more companies agreed than disagreed that there was an increase in these key performance indicators in the year following GFSI certification. A majority of respondents (81%) agreed that there was a substantial investment in staff time since certification, and 50% agreed there was a significant capital investment. This survey is the largest and most representative of global food manufacturers conducted to date.

Understanding Complex Governance Relationships in Food Safety Regulation

In this article, we discuss the value of the RIT model for analyzing complex governance relationships in the regulation of food safety. By exploring food safety regimes involving the European Union and the Global Food Safety Initiative, we highlight the diverse and complex relationships between the actors in public, private, and hybrid regimes of food safety regulation. We extend the basic RIT model to better fit the reality of (hybrid) governance relationships in the modern regulation of food safety, arguing that the model enables disaggregation of these regimes into analytical subunits or “regulatory chains,” in which each actor contributes to and affects the regulatory process. Finally, we critically assess what the RIT model adds to alternative theoretical approaches in identifying, mapping, and explaining the different roles that actors play vis-à-vis others in regulatory regimes.