Enforcing citrus production and packaging standards in southern Morocco
© FAO/Alessandra Benedetti

Food control system

With food traded widely across borders, adequate national regulations, legal frameworks and enforcement are essential.

Effective national food control systems assure the safety and quality of foods being traded both nationally and internationally. They also fight food fraud, ensuring fair practices that foster economic opportunities for all parties along the food chain.

Food control systems include regulatory elements, such as legislation and official controls, and complementary processes, such as the sharing of information and training. The establishment of trusting relationships between all involved – government, academia, business and consumers – is paramount.

There must be appropriate legal and policy instruments; sound institutional frameworks; well-qualified human resources; and adequate financial assets, equipment and infrastructure, including access to laboratories. And these must target the right priorities. FAO’s experience and expertise guarantee national authorities support at every level.

We are also active where food is produced: farmers and food processors must be equipped to grow, rear, harvest and process food free of harmful chemical residues and pathogens. This allows food business operators to win trust locally and abroad, thereby increasing food security and locking in income. FAO’s farmer field schools (FFS), developed 25 years ago, remain highly prized thanks to their personalized, “bottom up” approach. Concepts and principles of food safety are being integrated into FFS training, including those related to the prevention of antimicrobial resistance.

Food control system assessment

Many of us increasingly eat a mixture of imported and locally produced food, from an ever more diverse supply chain.

This can present difficulties for national authorities in charge of food controls, who lack direct oversight of the production processes of foreign trading partners. Meeting requirements for paperless trade and certification may also be a challenge, especially in developing countries.

This is another area where FAO plays a crucial role. We work with government authorities, international organizations and partners to promote fair trade practices, stimulate dialogue between importing and exporting countries, and offer guidance on assessing food control mechanisms.

FAO’s Food Control Assessment Tool helps national authorities develop food control systems which are harmonized, objective and consensual.

Improving food control systems in Africa

The African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) was established in 2018. It is a regional trading group with a wide membership, covering a population of 1.3 billion. The intention is for AfCFTA to boost intra-African trade by at least 50 percent in the short term, and make the continent more competitive in the global economy.

Much of the liberalized trade will be in food. And this food needs to be safe.

In 2022, FAO initiated an ambitious project with the Comoros, Eswatini, Kenya, Mauritius, Rwanda and Seychelles – all AfCFTA Member States – to assess their national food control systems. Funded by the European Union, the work has already shown itself to be a uniquely valuable learning process for all involved: government authorities, academics, consumer organizations and the private sector.

The project is helping ensure that the countries’ food control systems have sufficient capacity, are better able to harmonize, and are capable of communicating feedback. The aim is to dismantle obstacles to freer, more extensive trade, while protecting consumers in Africa and beyond the continent’s borders.

Strengthening governance and regulatory control

With a unique reservoir of knowledge accumulated over more than 40 years, covering differing legal traditions, FAO plays a major part in supporting countries to build a practicable food control system.

This may involve drafting or amending food safety legislation, and making sure it is internationally compliant, so that operators in the food chain are properly guided and, if necessary, held to account.

Integral to all of this is FAO’s FAOLEX resource, the world’s largest legislative database on food and agriculture. Active since 1995, it is continuously updated, with an average of 8 000 new entries added each year.

Explore the world’s premier database on agrifood policy and legislation

FAO's document cover page on how approach to food fraud

FAOLEX currently contains legal and policy documents in over 40 languages, drawn from more than 200 countries, territories and regional economic integration organizations. Recent additions to the database include Croatia’s new law on food hygiene and microbiological criteria for food, and a wide-ranging food safety law in Azerbaijan.

Another area where FAO legal expertise helps combat food safety threats is in helping national governments develop a coherent approach to food fraud. To this effect, an extensive FAO document identifies and analyses possible regulatory approaches, from food vulnerability assessments to traceability exercises to class action lawsuits.

Remote food inspection in Ghana

The COVID-19 pandemic created unprecedented challenges for national food control authorities. How could inspections, monitoring and other routine functions be conducted, when social distancing was mandated and remote work the norm?

In Ghana, FAO joined the Veterinary Service Directorate and the Food and Drug Authority to explore digital solutions that could enable remote inspection of food businesses and dispense online training.

A digital platform has been developed to capture self-control information from businesses. It also monitors parameters such as temperature through remote sensors. The data can be reviewed at a distance by national food control officers.

©FAO

A pilot project has also been conducted at the large abattoir at Kumasi in Ashanti region, with personnel trained to input key information on premises maintenance and cleanliness, the storage and transportation of meat, and pest control.

Automation, artificial intelligence, big data and blockchain technology are crucial tools in minimizing risk and enhancing food safety management. It is also the case that in an increasingly digital environment, international trading partners must know how to participate in paperless electronic business or use voluntary third-party assurance. FAO works for solutions that are fair, to avoid throwing up barriers to markets and trade for developing countries.

Building capacity in Azerbaijan, the Republic of Moldova and Türkiye

The FAO Regional Office for Europe and Central Asia is supporting these countries to develop their technical capacity to manage and communicate food safety crises.

Our work takes a comprehensive approach that considers the legal basis, technical capacities, documented procedures, and a continuous review of the mechanisms involved.

Veterinarian training for a young Syrian refugee at a chicken farm in Mersin, Türkiye
© FAO/Ridvan Vahapo

Each of the three countries is setting up a multi-agency coordination group which, with FAO guidance, will develop a food safety emergency response plan that clearly outlines the steps to be taken in times of crisis, including risk assessment, management and communication.

Aside from advice on the regulatory framework, FAO is providing training to ensure technical staff from the relevant government bodies are properly equipped with the skills and knowledge they need. We will round off the work by conducting detailed simulation exercises to stress-test the plans, and develop a framework for monitoring and evaluation to keep them pertinent in the future.

Crisis prevention and management

Maintaining food safety day in, day out is a significant undertaking. When standards are breached, a local problem may easily turn into an international incident.

As a multilateral organization, FAO can advise on the likelihood of such incidents, including the precise way hazards could be transmitted through the food chain. The Organization can help build resilience, and in worst-case outcomes, suggest mitigating steps.

Jointly with WHO, FAO leads global information and prevention networks that draw upon national food safety authorities and experts to prevent, prepare for and respond to food safety incidents and emergencies.

The International Food Safety Authorities Network – INFOSAN – is one such instrument, designed to facilitate the rapid exchange of information during food safety-related incidents. Practical measures that INFOSAN can promote include launching consumer warnings or targeted product recalls.

Meat production in Thailand

Prevention is better than cure, and strong food controls ward off food safety incidents in the first place. FAO’s work in Thailand’s livestock sector offers a good example.

In 2015, when we began implementing a livestock supply chain management project, the sector was vulnerable to food safety risks. These were linked to gaps in oversight and overlapping institutional responsibilities.

The advent of a regional common trading area in the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), and Thailand’s ambition to become a hub within a now-expanded export market, meant better food control systems were a priority.

We implemented a 2.5-year project in Chiang Mai and Saraburi provinces to help food control authorities coordinate their work. Experts supported authorities in devising a roadmap to strengthen systems at provincial and national level, by harmonizing guidelines for the monitoring and surveillance of livestock products.

The new management tools also equipped authorities to address food safety emergencies with a national INFOSAN website, along with more efficient ways of communicating with each other.

Dominated by small businesses, Thailand’s livestock sector now enjoys greater stability in the provision of quality safe food for domestic and export markets, as well as practices that are aligned to national and international standards.

Food safety in natural disasters

The volcanic eruption in the Tongan archipelago on 15 January 2022 was the largest recorded since Krakatoa in 1883: it triggered tsunami waves up to 15 metres in height. While few direct casualties were identified, up to 85 percent of the population was affected, with ashfall accounting for much of the damage.

Ash from volcanic eruptions often contains toxic chemicals that can enter the food supply though contact with crops, animals grazing in fields where the ash has fallen, and contaminated water. FAO experts were able to provide the Tongan authorities with essential and timely public health guidance.

Food trade in a complex world

Since 1995, the global trade in agrifood products has doubled: by 2018 it had reached USD 1.5 trillion in value. Over a third of exports now cross borders at least twice before reaching consumers.

Along with the benefits in terms of choice and prices come substantial new challenges for the management of food safety. The harmonization of food safety standards across borders, for example, or tracing the origins of food in a timely manner, are now much more demanding processes.

When any breach of food control is identified, the key step is to rapidly inform governments, food producers and, of course, consumers. But notification systems vary greatly from country to country: they may be digitized, though are often manual or entirely ad hoc. The less efficient the system, the greater the potential damage to human health and to trade.

FAO is a founding partner of WTO’s Standards and Trade Development Facility. The body aims to help producers in developing countries meet food safety standards by promoting collaboration and greater access to knowledge and innovation. It represents an important means for producers in low-income countries to gain access to markets and benefit from cross-border trade.