Current food safety problems in China include the rampant use of additives. Behind these problems, there are deeper issues related to the economy, society, management and law. In order to smoothly carry out research into food safety problems, greater efforts are needed in science, engineering, law, economics, management, politics, sociology, journalism, communication, ethics, statistics and psychology.

A legal system should be established that allocates fair and reasonable rights and responsibilities for food safety to enhance its management. The law is able to fully define rights and responsibilities of all parties, including producers, operators, consumers and supervisors. The Research Institute of Food Safety Law at Renmin University of China often participates in the formulation, amendment and evaluation of food safety legislation and judicial interpretation.

In terms of studying human behavior and food resource allocation, economics plays a significant role in the food safety governance. The research of food safety problems from an economic perspective has been booming, which is related to various themes of the game between enterprise and government, regulation failure, control of food industry chain, social responsibilities of food enterprises and compulsory liability insurance in food safety. Food production, circulation and consumption are typically economic issues.

Human behavior and organizational actions influence food safety governance. Management can be divided into two sub-disciplines: public management and enterprise management.

Supervision of food safety is the responsibility of the former, while safety management of food enterprises rests with the latter. A lot of management models have been developed to ensure total quality management, risk management, emergency management, information management and standardization management.

Some effective forms of management technology, including the Hazard Analysis Critical Control Point, have been widely used in recent years. The various roles of management in food safety will undeniably be stressed in the future.

Apart from the aforementioned disciplines, there are also other indispensable considerations in food safety. In order to realize the co-governance of food safety, we cannot depart from the guidance of sociology.

Sociology always pays more attention to some basic social phenomena since its emergence and various kinds of related research methods can be used to reveal the fundamental reasons of food safety scandals.

Currently, many rumors have been spread in society and consumers usually believe these rumors and even question the credibility of some official organizations. Communication between governments, experts, enterprises, media and consumers has become a necessary part of food safety governance. In addition, some countries have drawn a high degree of attention to China’s food safety problems and trade disputes have inevitably emerged. Some imported foods also have a bad impact on Chinese people’s health.

The role of humanities and social sciences has been steadily emphasized in the field of food safety governance. Growing cooperation has been forged involving science, engineering, agriculture and medicine, which has contributed to the improvement of China’s governance system and overall modernization of governance.

Heng Dayuan is from the School of Law at Renmin University of China; Meng Tao is from the Coordination and Innovation Center on Food Safety Administation at Renmin University of China).

The Chinese link: http://www.cssn.cn/hqxx/xkdt/xkdtnews/201403/t20140304_1017649.shtml

Translated by Chen Meina
Revised by Tom Fearon