Food safety is now a priority to in export strategy share globally. You can buy and sell food products within EU and abroad, but under several rules. Food safety becomes an essential part for trade policy serving EU growth strategy. food safety at all stages of the food and feed chain, from seed to finished product, from farm to fork. It requires traceability of products and integrated controls and involves concretes sanctions in case of violation and un-compliance. The food business operator (FBO) has the primary responsibility for each product he produces, processes, imports, markets or administers. The main legislative instruments drawing the EU regulatory path towards food safety are three. The first one is the White Paper on food safety (2000); the second is the Regulation (EC) 178/2002 which also established the EFSA and EU rapid alert system (RASFF); finally there is the “Hygiene Package” which came into effect in 2006.
Why food safety is a pillar of a commercial trade policy? During the Cibus Tec convention, it was said that tariff and non tariff barriers can reach almost 40% of agro-food products value. According to conservative estimations by the Italian Association of Meat Industry (ASSICA), the sanitary barriers for pork and pork meat products count for 250 mln/€ per year. Non-tariff barriers to trade (NTBs) may include: import quotas, special licenses, unreasonable standards, bureaucratic delays at customs, export subsidies, technical barriers to trade (TBT), sanitary and phitosanitary measures (SPS), excessive administrative fulfillment, certifications, authorization of exporting factories, rules of origin. The use of NTBs gradually grew when WTO rules reduced tariffs because of multilateral, regional, and bilateral negotiations and trade agreements, causing the fragmentation of the markets and food safety uncertainties.
To achieve the goals companies have to face, they need a joint effort of the policy makers, the public authorities and the private sector. A public- private sector joint effort is the way forward overcoming own short-term interests, in order to look at common long-term interests. It is crucial coordinating governance policies and encouraging global free trade of goods by avoiding the instrumental establishment of barriers both tariff and non.