Traceability and transparency

Foods followed from the field to the plate !

The health authorities, agricultural professionals and food manufacturers make use of everything available to them to ensure flawless knowledge about the origin of ingredients and products which enter into the composition of foodstuffs that are then sold.

Since 1st July 2005, the obligation of traceability has been extensive in the European Union. It makes it possible to be able to follow the movement of products, from the field to the shop - whether it be in France or abroad - passing through the factory, transport, place of storage and distribution, so as to guarantee at the same time origin and safety, at each stage from the preparation process to the final product.

 

According to the international standard ISO 8402, traceability is « the ability to rediscover the history, use or the location of an entity, through the medium of registered identifications».

An example in the cattle industry : identification and traceability

Since 1978, cattle have been the subject in France of a special monitoring process from their birth through to their sale on the market. They carry on each ear a buckle upon which is a 10-digit national identification number. This number is recorded again on a passport in which is recorded a multitude of information on the animal such as its regional identification, its work number, its sex, its race, date of birth as well as its successive movements since its birth. The passport includes a space to insert a health accreditation; the passport and the attestation are required at each movement of the animal and at the abattoir, where each quarter and each piece of the carcass are identified at each stage of processing of the carcass. This information is available up to the point of sale. Consumers can, via this system, know the animal's origin (country) from where the aboughtcheté meat product comes from.

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The label is a component of traceability. A source of information, it allows the consumer to be informed and to go back through the whole of the production chain.

 

In France, obligatory mentions on labels are the following: designation of product for sale, list of ingredients, identification of manufacturer, manufacturing batch number, net weight, optimal use-by date or consume by date, use and safety instructions, veterinary stamp in the case of a product of animal origin.

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Our objective is transparency: information in case of alert

The French authorities have an obligation to provide information and be transparent with regards to consumers.

Even if food has never been as safe as now and if the risks are truly less than in the past, incidents remain possible in spite of numerous measures put in place.

 

Human listeriosis : In the 1980s, between 11 and 14 cases were recorded annually compared with 4 in 2000 according to the National Reference and Obligatory Declaration Centre. If national and European alerts grow in number, it is due to the reinforcement of vigilance, monitoring, technical and scientific developments made.

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If needed, an alert system is activated by the authorities if it has not already been done by the company or the organisation concerned, which is legally responsible for the marketing of their products. The alert given allows those products at risk to be indentified in order to withdraw them from points of sale and to inform consumers, so that they bring back defective products that they have bought.

When there is an alert on an exported product, information reaches the health authorities of the importing country to allow them to take action.

Abroad, it is the agriculture attachés and French vets positioned in the embassies who ensure the links with the national health authorities.