Fanfan OUYANG，F(xiàn)angm ing DENG

Hunan Agricultural University，Changsha 410128，China

From the＂Map of Food Safety Accidents＂issued recently，we can see that Hunan Province hasmany food safety accidents［1］，shown in Fig.1.In just3months，near40 tons（3million yuan）of pork from diseased or dead pigs from Fujian Province flew to Hunan Province［2］；deteriorated rice flour in Xingzhi Middle School in Lianyuan City of Hunan Province，and treating rat，mink and fox meatwith chemicals in order to pass them off as beef and mutton caused great commotion of public opinion［3］；sulfur smoked pepper appeared in Baizhu Village of Tiaoma Town in Changsha County of Hunan Province［4］.Besides，with widespread application of chemicals and new technologies in food processing，new food safety problems emerge in large numbers，causing a mild panic to themasses［5］，making food safety become a hot spot of the whole society，and also the difficult point of government［6］.At such practical background，research on food safety problems is extremely urgent［7］.

1 Existing food safety problems in Hunan Province and cause analysis

1.1 Existing quality safety problems in production of major agricultural products in Hunan Province and cause analysis

Long enjoyed the reputation of＂land of fish and rice＂，Hunan Province is rich in agricultural products，including rice，live pigs，vegetable oil，oranges and tangerines，tea，and vegetable.Hunan Province has been incorporated into national superior industrial belt.Agricultural products are not only major food sources，but also essential raw materials of food industry.Quality and safety of agricultural products are important factors influencing food safety.According to survey，in the planting of agricultural products，to ensure grain yield，the use of pesticide，chemical fertilizer，and hormone are unavoidable.In Hunan Province，most farmers firstly consider prevention and control effect when purchasing pesticide.Most farmers do not take any safety protection measure when using pesticides.They discard pesticide package and residue at will.

These chemical substances will remain in raw materials，and consequently influence food safety.Chlorinated pesticides are widely applied due to high efficiency，low cost and acute toxicity.For example，the prohibited DDT is extremely difficult to be decomposed and it can stay in water and soil for as long as several decades.However，such high residue pesticide is still illegally produced and used in some areas.In addition，agricultural products may be indirectly polluted from air，soil and water in the process of planting due to excess heavy metals.Hunan Province is rich in nonferrous metals，while pollution of heavy metals such as Cd，Pb，As and Zn may lead to excess residue of heavy metals in vegetable and rice.Besides，in the process of breeding，to prevent diseases and promote rapid growth of livestock，breeding farmers will use veterinary drugs and hormone，which will threaten food safety greatly［8-13］.

1.2 Existing quality safety problems in processing and circulation of major agricultural products in Hunan Province and cause analysisIn 2012，output value of food industry in Hunan Province exceeded 300 billion yuan，bringing Hunan Province into powerful provinces of food industry.But in food processing and circulation，there are still some safety problems.Excessive use of food additives（preservative agent）or non-food grade pigment，crisp keeping agent，and odor ant will lead to hidden problem of food safety.Some enterprises may produce foods using illegal or improper process，or do not conduct disinfection work.As a result，some pathogens remain in food production or storage process and accordingly lead to food safety problem.With the scientific progress and biotechnological development，more new technologies and resources are applied in food production，but they also bring some food safety problems.In circulation process，food storage and transportation fail to reach proper temperature and humidity，and use of plastic packagewill lead to degradation，decay or chemical pollution，accordingly become problem foods［13-17］.

1.3 Existing problems in food quality and safety supervision system of Hunan Province and cause analysisFirstly，according to existing China's Food Safety Law，the State Council established the Food Safety Committee to oversee a chain of depart-ments.Roughly speaking，the agricultural department supervises agricultural products，which include animal feed and pesticides.The quality supervision department is in charge of food production and processing；the industry and commerce department oversees food sales；the food and drug department is responsible for catering services；the health department assesses food-safety risks，formulates food-safety standards，as well as determines inspection requirements.It does this by working with the relevant departments.The health department also organizes investigations into major food-safety accidents.At the same time，the public security department handles crimes related to food safety.It is reported that including these fivemajor departments，there are more than a dozen govern mentagencies involved in China's food-safety supervision［17］.Such top-down system easily leads to imperfect supervision system，incomplete management，inadequate enforcement，and vacant supervision of industrial associations.Some lawless people will take such opportunity to substitute defective goods for qualified goods，such as treating fungus or squid with chemical agent，or treating fish or rice with pigment［7］.Some lawless people deliberately make＂new product＂without any testing basis and fabricate some grounds favorable for human health to attract consumers to buy.For example，the green rice is artificially processed.It is not green food and will harm human health.

Secondly，laws，regulations and standards are not adjusted promptly with economic and sci-tech development.At present，the Good Manufacturing Practice（GMP）which is recognized as themosteffective and efficient quality control system for food safety and the Hazard Analysis Critical Control Point（HACCP）are notwidely applied in China［7］.

Fig.1 MapofFoodSafetyAccidents

2 Study on foreign food safety management

2.1 Characteristics of food safety management in USA

2.1.1 Having relatively comprehensive laws and regulations and powerful supervision authorities.Laws and regulationsof the United States on food hygiene and safety supervision have reached the top national level.There are basic laws，such as United States Code and Code of Federal regulations（CFR）issued by House of Representatives，F(xiàn)ood Code formulated by FDA and USDA，and comprehensive legislations，such as Natural Toxins＆Pesticides Guidance Documents＆Regulations，F(xiàn)air Packaging and Labeling Act，and Food Quality Protection Act，and also some specific food regulations，such as Federal Meat Inspection Act，Egg Products Inspection Act，and Registration of Low Acid Food，etc［9］.

Besides，with development of national economy，science and technology，improvement of management system，and increase in safety awareness，American government attaches great importance to timely revision and adjustment of laws and regulations［18-19］.In the supervision of food safety，there are FDA，USDA，F(xiàn)SIS，EPA，and NMFS in the United States［20］.

2.1.2 Having effective and scientific food safety management system.The United States has a complete set of effective and scientific food safety management system based on whole-process management and riskmanagement［21］.

2.1.3 Having practical whole-process supervision of food safety.The United States implements whole-process supervision of food from farmland to dining table.From planning，planting，warehouse inspection and acceptance，storage，distribution，production and use，quantity tracing，end products，circulation and scrapping，all processeshave detailed records and special management［20］.Besides，it also has established traceable network.For example，there are real-time food-borne disease inspection network that is able to trace food-borne diseases in real time，and also molecular subtyping inspection network having advanced diagnosis and analysis technology［21］.

2.2 Characteristics of food safety management in the EU

2.2.1 Having unified and coordinated food safety laws and regulations and supervision system.The EU always cares about food safety and has set up strict food safety legal system［22］.In 1997，the EU issued Green Paper on Food Law；in 2000，it issued White Paper on Food Safety，forming a system of existing laws，regulations and standards；in January 2002，it promulgated Regulation EC／178／2002；together with Food Labeling，Application of Food Additives，and GMO Food，it has set up a unified and coordinated European Commission of Legal Regulation System［13，23］.On January 28，2002，the European Commission setup the European Food Safety Authority（EFSA）formanaging all matters related to food safety，responsible for directly talking with consumers as to food safety problems，and establishing cooperative network of food hygiene and scientific research institutions between member countries［14］.

2.2.2 Characteristics of food safety supervision in the EU.

（1）Consumer-centered.The EU food safety laws and regulations fully reflect respect and value of consumers.For example，the EU Food Safety Social Supervision System centers on consumers and stresses construction of supervision ability of consumers and subject status of public supervision［11］.

（2）Highly transparent food information.Information transparency is the key point in social supervision of food safety.High information transparency runs through the entire White Paper on Food Safety and isa distinctive characteristic of EU food safety supervision.Information transparency is mainly reflected in competent authorities and operators［11］.

（3）Implementation of traceable system.Through implementing the traceable system，the EU ensures tracing inspection of food from production to sales，which effectively increases efficiency of treating food accidents and forms powerful constraint of operators of food industry.Under the General Food Law formulated by European Commission in January 2002，＂traceability＂means the ability to track any food，feed，food-producing animal or substance thatwill be used for consumption，through all stages of production，processing and distribution［11］.

2.2.3 Paying special attention to potential hazard of GMO food.The EU considers that GMO food may cause certain harm to human health and ecological environment，thus takes measures to resist and most EU consumers also take cautious attitude towards GMO food［16］.The UK，F(xiàn)rance，and Russia also take measures to stop sales and use of GMO food［17］.

2.3 Characteristics of food safety management in Japan

2.3.1 Perfect food safety legislation.The Food Sanitation Law of Japan not only includes food sanitation，but also clearly specifies personal sanitation，responsibilities of operators，facility standard，management and operation standard，supervision and inspection standard and punishment in food additives，tools，processing machinery，packaging，transportation，and storage.For producers and operators breaking laws and regulations，strict punishment will be imposed，including fines，suspending business，rescinding business license，or even bearing criminal responsibility［18］.

2.3.2 Strict food safety management.Food safety management of Japan is like a systematic project，every part of food safety has strict regulation in laws and legislations［19］.For example，for vegetable production，unregistered pesticide should not be used，and the use of registered pesticide should be carried out under guidance of related department and in proper growth period of crops；it also has set up scientific inspection system to test residual pesticide in agricultural products，and strictly prohibited to use high toxic and high residual pesticide in the production of vegetable and fruit［18］.

2.3.3 Implementation of food ID card program.Food production enterprises in Japan should input their food information into designated information management system.Every type of food has corresponding bar code.Farmers in Japan Agricultural Cooperatives also have to set up electronic files for their vegetable，melon and fruit，meat，eggs，and dairy products.This file involves production place，producer，type，times，and use volume of pesticide，type，times and use amount of fertilizer，harvesting time，sales time.Once there is any safety accident of food，it is easily to trace producer and transporter of the food［24］.

3 Countermeasures and recommendations

Hunan Province has many problems of food safety.These problems not only threaten health of consumers，but al so make food production enterprises incur huge losses，and also restrict economic development of Hun an Province.In line with existing problems of food safety and with reference to foreign experience and measures，it is recommended to take following countermeasures.

3.1 Establishing food safety network platformThrough establishing food safety network platform，it is expected to provide popular science education for all people in food safety knowledge and safe breeding and cultivation knowledge，make people realize the importance of food safety，and improve people's awareness for safeguarding their rights.Besides，it is able to provide post box，e-mail address，and telephone number for the purpose of right safeguarding.This network platform covers all villages and towns，so government departments can manage and issue food safety traceable code，farmers can provide information related to their agricultural products，quality inspection institutions can submit agricultural product testing report，processing enterprises can supply processing information，and consumers can trace food information at any time.The establishment of this network platform is helpful for exchange and interaction of food safety problems，changing current asymmetric status of food safety information，and favorable for government receiving complaints of citizens about food safety，and also favorable for solving food safety problem fundamentally［4，20］.

3.2 Use of various simple food safety testing instrumentIt is recommended to develop some simple instrument to test pesticide residue in food and to facilitate consumers selecting safe food.In May 2013，Peng Jiaqi and other 6 students from Hunan Agricultural University developed＂Food Note-A Personal Diet Safety Assistant Based on Big Data＂，forming a complete set of food additive safety value and diet nutrition evaluation scheme.Using mobile phone，it is able to evaluate status of personal diet safety，including if food additives exceed relevant standard，so it becomes a real food safety guard［25］.With proper modification，we can produce a tool to rapidly test nutrients of various foods，and also rapidly test harmful and toxic substances，and the tested values can not be changed artificially.The instrument should be simple in operation and affordable for consumers，so that consumers can test food safety in supermarket，vegetable market，and restaurant.

3.3 Establishing one package service for production and sales of safe and green foodGreen food should be produced on the basis of demand.For example，the production of green vegetable，fruit and live pigs，it is recommended to survey demands of consumers and ask them to make order.In addition，no chemical fertilizer and pesticide should be used in production of green vegetable and fruit，and no feed additive should be applied in breeding live pigs.Instead，green vegetable and fruit and live pigs should grow naturally and then be supplied to consumers directly.Food processing should be also like this.Restaurant should cook food to consumers'face，and fruit juice should be squeezed on the spot without addition of any additive.Non-staple food processing like biscuit should also adopt thismethod，namely，order→ processing→directly delivering to consumers or processing to consumers'face.

3.4 Gradually applying safe and effective biological pesticide and chem ical fertilizerSince thewhole nature isa biological chain and any living thing has its own constraint，all insects are no exception and have their natural pesticide（constraint）.Besides，if there are insects breeding too rapidly and the nutrition is quite good，they can be processed into nutritive products for directly eating.Biological fertilizer may be researched and developed according to demands，and somemay ans wermultiple purposes，like production of marsh gas fertilizer.

3.5 Advocating low-carbon food consumptionWith global warming and climate change，people's awareness of green consumption is increasing，and low carbon diet has become an important subject for sustainable ecological development.All countries are taking countermeasures to reduce impact of food consumption on environment.For example，some advocate localization of food distribution system，to reduce distance of supply chain，so as to reduce energy use and greenhouse gas emission related to food transport，processing，packaging，and storage.Urban agriculture turns urban role from consumers to producers，provides methods for urban residents to produce some agricultural products in urban areas or industrial areas，to reduce impact on environment and strengthen elasticity of urban food supply.The establishment of food bank system is favorable for promoting recovery of food，encouraging families to use food residue and kitchen waste to make compost，reduce food waste and save financial expenditure of family on food.Also，it is expected to speed up the low carbon process and realize harmonious development of human，nature and society［26-27］.

4 Conclusions

With globalization of food production and trade，consumers'awareness for food safety is increasing.Food safety is a complex social problem and stays an extremely important position in social and economic development.Chinese government has takenmany practical and powerful measures to contain strict food safety problem，but there are stillmany new problems.Therefore，control of food safety is notamakeshift，buta long arduous task to be undertaken jointly bymany government departments.

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