New Report Tackles Food Safety Risks in Developing Countries

A report commissioned by the International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI) and the CGIAR Initiative on One Health highlights the need for innovative strategies to address food safety risks in the informal sector of developing countries.

The report, "New Directions for Tackling Food Safety Risks in the Informal Sector of Developing Countries," sheds light on the dominant role of small-scale processors, grocers, market vendors, and food service operators in informal markets in more than 20 low- and lower-middle-income countries' food systems and emphasizes that a wholesale shift is needed to operationalize safer food in the informal sector.

Despite ongoing structural changes, the prevalence of small-scale food businesses remains prominent in the food systems of most developing countries, according to the report. These informal players play a crucial role in the domestic markets for high-nutrient foods such as fish, meat, fruits and vegetables.

"Previous studies have shown widespread issues of food contamination within informal food distribution networks," said Steven Jaffee, co-author of the report and lecturer in the Department of Agricultural and Resource Economics at the University of Maryland.

Factors contributing to this problem include inadequate food safety awareness, poor hygiene practices, substandard food storage and preparation methods and deficient infrastructure and environmental conditions.

Few countries have strategies in place to address food safety risks in the informal sector, according to the report, and surveys have shown low levels of food safety among workers in that sector. Current approaches often focus on disrupting small-scale operators in an attempt to replace them with a vision of a modern food system.

"Over the past two decades, ILRI has been working with national and local authorities to create an enabling environment, providing training and appropriate technologies to value chain actors, and most importantly, assuring incentives are in place for better practice by food producers, handlers and consumers," said Hung Nguyen, co-leader of the Animal and Human Health Program at ILRI.

According to the report, most existing policies and resources aimed at domestic food safety in developing countries concentrate on strengthening centralized systems for food control. While investments have been made in testing laboratories, food company inspection units and national agency capacities, these efforts primarily focus on medium and larger food enterprises within the formal sector. Insufficient attention has been given to informal food operators and businesses, resulting in a missed opportunity to improve food safety in this crucial sector.

"It is clear that doing more of the same will not yield safer food in the informal sector," said Spencer Henson, a professor in the Department of Food, Agricultural and Resource Economics at the University of Guelph, Canada, and co-author of the report. "Nothing less than a paradigm shift is required to effectively address food safety risks moving forward."

The report recommends the following key approaches:

The report highlights several examples of existing initiatives offering insights into the successful application of decentralized and multisectoral approaches.

"The challenge now is to convince funders and implementers to take these successful and affordable approaches to scale," said Nguyen.