AUTHOR=Yu Huiqin , Song Yinghua , Lv Wei , Liu Dan , Huang Haining 

TITLE=Food safety risk assessment and countermeasures in China based on risk matrix method

JOURNAL=Frontiers in Sustainable Food Systems

VOLUME=Volume 8 - 2024

YEAR=2024

URL=https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/sustainable-food-systems/articles/10.3389/fsufs.2024.1351826

DOI=10.3389/fsufs.2024.1351826

ISSN=2571-581X

ABSTRACT=In order to identify high-risk patterns of food safety and assist regulatory authorities in making intelligent decisions regarding the scientific management of food safety risks, the risk matrix method, along with the Borda method, is used to evaluate the food safety risks. Based on the constructed food safety incident database, the risk matrix method is applied for static risk assessment from seven aspects: food categories, years, provinces, incident entities, causes, pollution sources, and links, and for dynamic risk assessment in different provinces. The results indicate that the top five food categories in risk ranking are meat and meat products, fruits and vegetables, grain and grain products, other category, and aquatic products. Food safety risks show an increasing trend year by year, with the years 2012-2015 and 2019 having higher risk rankings.The top three provinces in risk ranking are Hunan, Guangdong, and Shaanxi. The top four entities in risk ranking are restaurants, enterprises, households, and canteens. The top four causes in risk ranking are human intention, human error, mismanagement, and production and social environment. The top four pollution sources in risk ranking include chemical pollution, other pollution, biological pollution, and food additives. The top three links in risk ranking include production and processing link, catering link, and agricultural production link. Across provinces, food safety risks in the years 2012-2015 are generally higher compared to other years, with the highest number of high-risk provinces in 2014. Based on the above results, the countermeasures for preventing and controlling food safety risks in China are proposed to mitigate food safety risks.