ESTIMATING THE INCIDENCE OF FOODBORNE SALMONELLA AND THE EFFECTIVENESS OF ALTERNATIVE CONTROL MEASURES

Foodborne illness incidence, Salmonella, Delphi method, United Kingdom, Food Consumption/Nutrition/Food Safety,

A Strategic Perspective on the Impact of Food Safety Standards on Developing Countries

This paper explores the competing concepts of 'standards as barriers' and standards as catalysts' in the context of food safety standards in international trade in agricultural and food products. It is suggested that food safety standards can act as both a barrier to trade and the basis of competitive positioning for developing countries in international markets. This suggests that the application of a strategic framework to analyze and assess alternative responses to evolving food safety standards can throw some light on the circumstances under which standards act to prohibit trade or, alternatively, create competitive trade opportunities. The use of such a framework is illustrated through a brief case study of fish and fishery product exports from Kenya and India.Agriculture, Food, Trade, Food Safety, Standards, Technical barriers to Trade, Food Consumption/Nutrition/Food Safety, Q18, K32, F13,

POLICY OPTIONS FOR OPEN BORDERS IN RELATION TO ANIMAL AND PLANT PROTECTION AND FOOD SAFETY

Agricultural and Food Policy, Food Consumption/Nutrition/Food Safety, International Relations/Trade,

QUANTIFYING THE IMPACT OF ECONOMIC INCENTIVES ON FIRMS' FOOD SAFETY RESPONSIVENESS: THE CASE OF RED MEAT AND POULTRY PROCESSING SECTOR IN CANADA

This study assesses quantitatively the economic incentives for firms to adopt food safety controls and the potential impact of a number of firm and market-specific characteristics on this behavior, focusing on the red meat and poultry-processing sector in Canada.food safety controls, economic incentives, adoption, food processing sectors in Canada, Food Consumption/Nutrition/Food Safety,

Determinants of Income Diversification among Fishing Communities in Western Kenya

Poverty, income Diversification, fish worker, Community/Rural/Urban Development, Food Security and Poverty, International Development, Labor and Human Capital, Production Economics,

MISASSESSED RISK IN CONSUMER VALUATION OF FOOD SAFETY: AN EXPERIMENTAL APPROACH

This study estimates Canadian consumers' willingness to pay for food safety improvements and identifies systematic misassessments of food-borne risks. Non-hypothetical experimental auctions were used to elicit consumer valuations of food safety improvement. Consistent with behavioural research, results suggest that subjects generally overestimate the likelihood of becoming ill due to food-borne disease relative to scientifically-estimated odds. Subjects were willing to pay a positive amount to reduce food-safety risk. Risk reductions' valuations increased with higher initial risk, supporting arguments of diminishing marginal value for risk reductions.Food Consumption/Nutrition/Food Safety,

The Canadian Bioproducts Industry Analysis of the Bioproduct Development Survey - 2004

Bioproducts are often presented as one of the potential saviours of Canadian agriculture, offering non-food applications for agricultural products. However, relatively little is known about the sector or the characteristics of the firms. This paper presents an analysis of the Canadian bioproducts sector based on the first survey of bioproduct firms in Canada. The survey was performed by Statistics Canada in 2004 using 2003 firm results. The paper analyzes the responses to the bioproducts survey on two important dimensions, by region and firm size. The results indicate that for most of Canada's 232 bioproducts firms, bioproducts are just one part of the business activities, accounting for less than one third of employees and slightly more than one quarter of total firm revenue. Bioproduct activities provide both market and environmental benefits. The major challenges to the industry are financing and regulation. However, the relative importance of bioproducts, benefits and strategies and the focus and success of firms vary dramatically by region and by firm size.Resource /Energy Economics and Policy,

An Analysis of Financing Innovation and Commercialization in Canada's Functional Food and Nutraceutical Sector

Growing consumer interest in functional foods and nutraceuticals has been seen as a significant business opportunity for the agri-food sector. Many of the new firms in this sector are small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs). These SMEs often face difficulties in obtaining financing for their functional food and nutraceutical innovation activities. We develop and implement two models to show what factors affect a firm's decision to seek external financing and the level of financing obtained. Firm size, being privately held and engaging in contractual arrangements, have negative impacts on the likelihood of a firm seeking external funding, while firms which are intensively involved in the functional food and nutraceutical sector, with greater prospects for business expansion and/or are involved in partnerships are more likely to seek external financing. Larger firms and those involved in functional food and nutraceutical research and development receive a greater amount of capital when they decided to raise capital. However, firms focused on functional foods and nutraceuticals, as opposed to more diversified firms, and those involved in product development and concept scale-up receive less capital. Our findings highlight the importance of public support in addressing the capital requirements of functional food and nutraceutical firms and underscore the considerable burden in this respect borne by smaller sized firms.Agribusiness,

A Multi-Factorial Risk Prioritization Framework for Food-Borne Pathogens

To lower the incidence of human food-borne disease, experts and stakeholders have urged the development of a science- and risk-based management system in which food-borne hazards are analyzed and prioritized. A literature review shows that most approaches to risk prioritization developed to date are based on measures of health outcomes and do not systematically account for other factors that may be important to decision making. The Multi-Factorial Risk Prioritization Framework developed here considers four factors that may be important to risk managers: public health, consumer risk perceptions and acceptance, market-level impacts, and social sensitivity. The framework is based on the systematic organization and analysis of data on these multiple factors. The basic building block of the information structure is a three-dimensional cube based on pathogen-food-factor relationships. Each cell of the cube has an information card associated with it and data from the cube can be aggregated along different dimensions. The framework is operationalized in three stages, with each stage adding another dimension to decision-making capacity. The first stage is the information cards themselves that provide systematic information that is not pre-processed or aggregated across factors. The second stage maps the information on the various information cards into cobweb diagrams that create a graphical profile of, for example, a food-pathogen combination with respect to each of the four risk prioritization factors. The third stage is formal multi-criteria decision analysis in which decision makers place explicit values on different criteria in order to develop risk priorities. The process outlined above produces a ‘List A’ of priority food-pathogen combinations according to some aggregate of the four risk prioritization factors. This list is further vetted to produce ‘List B’, which brings in feasibility analysis by ranking those combinations where practical actions that have a significant impact are feasible. Food-pathogen combinations where not enough is known to identify any or few feasible interventions are included in ‘List C’. ‘List C’ highlights areas with significant uncertainty where further research may be needed to enhance the precision of the risk prioritization process. The separation of feasibility and uncertainty issues through the use of ‘Lists A, B, and C’ allows risk managers to focus separately on distinct dimensions of the overall prioritization. The Multi-Factorial Risk Prioritization Framework provides a flexible instrument that compares and contrasts risks along four dimensions. Use of the framework is an iterative process. It can be used to establish priorities across pathogens for a particular food, across foods for a particular pathogen and/or across specific food-pathogen combinations. This report provides a comprehensive conceptual paper that forms the basis for a wider process of consultation and for case studies applying the framework.risk analysis, risk prioritization, food-borne pathogens, benefits and costs