Significance of official food control in food safety: Food business operators' perceptions

Finnish food business operators' (FBOs) opinions of the food control inspections performed by local authorities were evaluated, using a questionnaire. The production types of FBOs included were slaughterhouses, meat, fish and milk plants, egg-packing plants and storage facilities dealing with foods of animal origin. Based on a total of 459 responses, we noted that the impacts of official controls were considered valuable for food safety, since 78.8% of the respondents saw that the actions taken based on inspections had enhanced the safety of the products. The results also highlighted the importance of inspectors being familiar with the production processes to increase the efficacy of food control. More frequent visits by official inspectors correlated positively with FBOs' conceptions of noncompliances being relevant for food safety. The FBOs saw local inspectors as the most important sources of new information concerning food safety legislation and 89.1% of the respondents confirmed that discussions with local inspectors had helped them understand the food safety risks within their processes. We also noted that the bigger the FBO, the more clearly they seem to perceive the risks associated with their processes (Spearman's rank correlation coefficient r = 0.127, P = 0.009). ► There are differences between types of FBOs in evaluating food safety risks. ► Food safety risk points in production should be assessed together with inspector. ► Inspector being familiar with the processes enhances the effect of official control. ► The effect of food control could be intensified through guidance on legislation. ► Higher inspection frequency improves the FBOs' insight on food control.