Evaluation of programmes to ensure food safety : guiding principles

Abstract

Presents concepts, arguments, and suggested lines of action that respond to the pressing need for better programmes to control food safety. Addressed to national authorities, the book emphasizes the importance of evaluation as a managerial tool for identifying food safety problems and designing appropriate corrective programmes. Throughout, an effort is made to help readers understand both the difficulty of implementing an effective food safety programme and the advantages that a sound programme can bring in terms of reduced economic losses and improved public health. Readers are given succinct factual profiles for each of the main pathogens responsible for food-borne disease, including information on their ecological behaviour, the foods most likely to be contaminated, the nature and severity of health effects, and special problems of detection and control. Having illustrated the complexity of food safety problems, the book then turns to questions of policy that can help national authorities to analyze national needs in food safety and determine the appropriate measures for meeting those needs. Guidance on the actual content and operation of the evaluation process is provided in the second half of the book, which sets out a series of possible questions to ask and points to consider when gathering data, identifying specific problems, and assessing present capacity to cope with these problems