Abstract

POTES, M. E.. Food safety in traditional products. Rev. de Ciências Agrárias [online]. 2007, vol.30, n.1, pp.439-447. ISSN 0871-018X.

There are an increasing concern from society in consuming food products that are in good conditions and, at least, do not damage human health and life. Several entities had been involved in assuring that the foods supplied to the consumers are proper and innocuous. This is the main goal of food safety, a subject analysed in “White Paper for Food Safety” (2000). This document proposed the creation, in Europe, of the European Food Authority and established a methodology based in four main principles: the characterization of the whole food chain; the traceability of foods and feeds; the responsibility of the several operators; and risk analysis. The precautionary principle and the rapid alert system are also important. Risk analysis, the base of the food safety policies, is composed by three components interconnected but performed by different entities: the risk assessment, the risk management and the risk communication. According this, the European Food Authority, named European Food Safety Agency (EFSA), is responsible by the risk analysis and by the risk communication, tasks developed in conditions of independence, excellency and transparency. The risk management, realized by the European Commission, must guarantee that the several Members States will adopted correctly the legislation produced taking into account the results of risk assessment. Respecting the main principles formerly mentioned, it was decided to build a coherent and transparent set of rules, commonly named “Food Hygiene Package”, that shall apply after 1^st January 2006. The objective of this legislation is to condense, to harmonize and to simplify the application of all hygiene rules, dispersed in a considerable number of legal instruments and to manage the food safety. It is an integrated approach of the hygiene rules applied to the whole food chain, aiming to assure a high level of protection of human life and health, to reduce trade barriers and to submit all food operators to the same rules. They also established some instruments of risk management and of possible food crisis. Respecting the fundaments of food safety this new legislation will give some attention to the traditional products, allowing some flexibility for the application of the food hygiene rules. This flexibility must be exerted in a complete transparency owing the free trade of the products.

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