Food Safety Issues

Food Safety issues affecting Accessibility, Utilization and Stability of supplies

Critical Food safety issues affecting Food Accessibility

There have been concerns that food accessed through food-aid and emergency programmes has not always been certified as safe. The latest direct threat to food safety revolves around Genetically Modified foods. The United States as a major benefactor is under no obligation to state whether the food has been genetically modified. Regional recipients do not have the wherewithal to conduct the appropriate tests. The safety assessment of GM foods generally investigates: (a) direct health effects (toxicity), (b) tendencies to provoke allergic reaction (allergenicity); (c) specific components thought to have nutritional or toxic properties; (d) the stability of the inserted gene; (e) nutritional effects associated with genetic modification; and (f) any unintended effects which could result from the gene insertion.  In the Caribbean context accessibility is often equated with the purchase or grant of imported food for the more vulnerable citizens. There is the perception that food recipients ought not to “look a gift horse in the mouth”. The authenticity and safety of food accessed via emergency aid or special arrangement transfers is very rarely challenged.

The imported food is made more competitive oftentimes due to the removal of tariffs.  Whilst none of the regional leaders who subscribe to that mechanism have publicly acknowledged that it is flawed, former U.S. President Bill Clinton has done so.   President Clinton, now a United Nations special envoy to Haiti, publicly apologized in March 2010 for championing policies that destroyed Haiti's rice production.  In the mid-1990s he encouraged the impoverished country to dramatically cut tariffs on imported U.S. rice.  "It may have been good for some of my farmers in Arkansas, but it has not worked. It was a mistake," Clinton told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on March 10. "I had to live everyday with the consequences of the loss of capacity to produce a rice crop in Haiti to feed those people because of what I did; nobody else."

Critical Food safety issues affecting Food Utilization.

A critical underpinning of food and nutrition security is that the food accessed will be utilized in a fashion that produces the greatest utility. This is not always the case especially for the groups at risk. The prevailing view is that the donor’s or State’s role is completed once the material transfer has been effected.   In the absence of targeted programmes, the eventual utilization can be compromised. A common example is in the preparation of parboiled rice, there are households that still “boil” rice in copious amounts of water and then “strain” the grains sending the nutrient-enriched water down the drain.

Food safety concerns abound in the utilization phase, where improper handling or preparation at the household level can compromise all of the due diligence that went in to its production and acquisition. Foods may be undercooked or prepared and stored under less than hygienic conditions.  The latter scenario exposes the food to physical, chemical and biological contamination.

Critical Food safety issues affecting Stability of supplies

The major household level activity geared to stabilize supplies usually encompasses storage.  There are food safety implications if the storage regimen is compromised by chemical deterioration, biological decomposition or physical contamination. The weather variations that can lead to disruptions in the supply of food are often contributory to the stored-food safety issues.  Heavy rains and flooding not only interrupt production, and distribution activities but can also trigger significant losses of stored food.   The growth of moulds of health significance such as Aspergillus spp. (aflatoxins) and contamination with E. coli from floodwater contamination are common examples.

Emergency operations, as are common after a weather-triggered event, often rely less on established procedures for the storage, packaging and distribution of food.  Given the accompanying shortage of potable water, the sanitizing of equipment, vehicles and utensils is often seen as a lower order priority.