Ongoing Work Within the Food Safety Quad

EU Workshop on Meat InspectionMay 18, 2010

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A history of collaboration

• Australia, Canada, New Zealand and the United States have a long history of collaboration in animal health, food safety and plant protection

• Food Safety Quadrilateral (FS Quad) meetings initiated almost 20 years ago– 19TH session held in the US in April 2010

• Initiated around the same time as the CCFICS– initially focussed on meat hygiene programs– advanced discussion on concepts such as HACCP, equivalency, risk analysis principles

and more recently, comparability

• Working groups have been established to address a range of safety and nutrition interests

– nutrition labelling and health claims– new and emerging issues such as melamine– risk communication– food defence– traceability– Codex and capacity building– import systems

• Similar to the Veterinary Agreement JMCs, focus on mechanisms to collaborate and share information

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Recent focus on program evolution…

• Food control measures, in particular for meat hygiene, have evolved to be onerous and prescriptive

– as improvements introduced they are added to existing measures– limited opportunities to demonstrate new approaches can replace existing

program

• Regulators are seeking more effective means to manage risk– and identify more objective means to demonstrate that risks are managed– risk based food import programs a current area of shared interest

• Our systems seem to achieve similar outcomes, focussed on using sound science and a risk basis

• We strive for continuous improvement, but in spite of shared interests in quantifying food safety outcomes, we are cautious in accepting differences in approaches

– measures are generally qualitative in nature– expression of ALOP and related equivalency assessment virtually impossible

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…and objective performance tools

• Quad countries have evolved differently, establishing a range of verification approaches

– each with objective data to demonstrate effectiveness and to support targeted risk management

• Enables risk profiling– and more effective use of resources in managing risk

• Profiles to guide risk management investment can include:– pathogen prevalence within a country– national and premises specific monitoring databases– performance of establishments– performance of the competent authority– links to public health data

• Quad has discussed factors that will impact regulators into the future, as well as pilot projects or initiatives that will contribute to knowledge and understanding of the effectiveness of our systems

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Concept of Measures Equivalency

• Several examples of equivalency exercises that focus on measures

• Onerous and time consuming to come to agreement

• Tacit acceptance of systems equivalency as a concept

• Are we really comparing consumer protection as intended by the WTO SPS

• No guidelines available for suitability or technical issues

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Concept of Systems Equivalency (Comparability)

• The Premise – different food control systems can produce the same likely outcomes

• Moving to systems equivalency approaches would– promote risk based import and export food control systems,

decreasing need for offshore verification– provide confidence that an exporting country will proactively

take safeguard measures when needed– support development of objective and transparent regulatory

performance systems that can be harmonized over time– provide for flexibility and innovation– support information sharing and proactive international

responses – provide an objective basis to demonstrate evolutionary

change of food control systems

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Canada – Environmental Scan

• Economic recovery may impact the resources available thus challenging us to be creative in the food safety and nutrition activities we undertake

• Increased global trade with new and different products from a wider variety of countries means increased complexity in the marketplace and at the borders

• Regulators are faced with increasingly diverse food safety and nutrition issues as the food supply evolves to meet consumer demands

• Consumers are demanding a greater role in development of policies and regulations and may expect more consideration of ethical, social and economic factors in decision making

• Science and technology advancements make it difficult to keep pace especially given the relatively static nature of policy and regulation

• National approaches may no longer be as effective since the products being regulated and their supply chains are multinational

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• Better utilisation of objective data, including company data to:– benchmark and identify issues and trends– assess establishment performance over time and against national averages– emphasise company management of performance– direct resources to areas of greatest need

• Identifies Key Performance Indicators and uses data from those indicators to determine both level and variability of performance

• Plant Performance Rating System encourages shared responsibility in meeting food safety outcomes

• Provides continuous monitoring of performance at both an establishment and industry level

– Allows timely interventions by AQIS and the establishment where required– Allows more targeted AQIS verification and audit activity at plant

Australia - Plant Performance Rating Project

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• Development of the comparability of systems equivalency concept

• Confidence in the CA is key to decisions on foreign audits and inspections– recognizes the investment of the exporting country CE– leverages off of trade history and shared knowledge

• Key resource is the verification systems of the Competent Authority– must be fully documented, performance based and focuses

on national rather than premises verification– independent audit and enforcement

• Integrated information systems eg VAOnline provide compliance and performance information in real time

New Zealand – “Comparability” and Competent Authority Verification

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• Develop a data-driven approach to inspection that:Develop a data-driven approach to inspection that:– Is based upon an integrated infrastructure that captures high quality dataIs based upon an integrated infrastructure that captures high quality data– Consists of data-driven decision making tools that allow data to be used in Consists of data-driven decision making tools that allow data to be used in

real time for decision makingreal time for decision making– Uses public health based measures to track performanceUses public health based measures to track performance

• Domestic InspectionDomestic Inspection: : Enhanced establishment and inspection data – drive Enhanced establishment and inspection data – drive inspection activities and Food Safety Assessmentsinspection activities and Food Safety Assessments

• Import InspectionImport Inspection: : Data-driven foreign country audits and POE inspection Data-driven foreign country audits and POE inspection activities – electronic interfaceactivities – electronic interface

• Export InspectionExport Inspection: : Automation of export certification processAutomation of export certification process

• Foreign Country Performance Tiers: Foreign Country Performance Tiers: Scope and frequency of audits Scope and frequency of audits

• Public Health Decision Criteria: Public Health Decision Criteria: to identify heightened inspection attention by to identify heightened inspection attention by FSIS FSIS

• Automated sampling algorithms: to direct sampling and followup activityAutomated sampling algorithms: to direct sampling and followup activity• Integrating real-time data toward predictive analyticsIntegrating real-time data toward predictive analytics

US – Public Health Information System

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• Further work to be done on the process for Further work to be done on the process for determining systems equivalencedetermining systems equivalence

• Factors and tools to support maintenance of Factors and tools to support maintenance of systems equivalence be developed in parallelsystems equivalence be developed in parallel

• Best practices to be considered on tools which Best practices to be considered on tools which would assist in demonstrating and/or would assist in demonstrating and/or maintaining systems equivalencemaintaining systems equivalence

• Potential pilot in the Spring of 2011Potential pilot in the Spring of 2011

Quad EU Discussions to continue

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QUESTIONS?QUESTIONS?

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