Food safety risk information should be released as soon as possible

In which areas have problems, the manager's thinking is basically: First, strictly crack down on severe crackdowns, and then strengthen legislation. Food safety is no exception. Calmly think, "sports law enforcement" may be effective for emergency, but it cannot be the normal management method. As far as legislation is concerned, “this is far from hydrolyzing nearly thirsty” is an inherent quality of legislation. Even if it is being formulated as the “most stringent food safety law” in history, I am afraid we cannot exhaust all possible food safety violations. The prevention, not to mention the legislation of a large country with a population of more than one billion people who love the food tradition.

In fact, there has never been absolute "safe" food in the world. The so-called "safety" is only a question of risk probability. Whether managers or the general public, we must first face and gradually accept such a concept. Since there is no absolute safety of food, the best effect that can be achieved by supervision is to enable the vast majority of foods in the market to meet publicly recognized safety standards. Since food safety standards are scientific issues that ordinary people will not be involved in, we can only trust the supervision of government departments with professional standards. Therefore, the effect of supervision is directly related to the government's credibility. The government’s credibility is directly related to the exchange of information between the government and the public.

Under the premise of accepting the concept of relative reliance on food safety, the exchange of information on food safety is actually an exchange of information on food safety risks. It is not a vague idea as to whether certain foods are qualified, but can be accurate to certain foods. Or how much of a certain ingredient in food has a detrimental effect on people's health. So why is "information exchange" not "information disclosure"? Because the latter is mainly open in one direction, the former emphasizes two-way interaction. The developed countries have accumulated a lot of such experience in the past few decades. We may wish to make more reference.

In the era of advanced Internet development and “self-media” flooding, the release of food safety risk information is more sensitive than ever and has a greater impact. The first paragraph of Article 124 of the revised draft of the Food Safety Law prohibits the unauthorized release of food safety information, and emphasizes that the corresponding administrative penalty is a very strict system, but its expected results are worrying: First, "heavy The causal relationship between "punishment" and "good effect" has never been a convincing proof, not to mention the limited power of law enforcement - consider the situation of China's population and the number of food production and processing companies, and don't forget to Small vendors of food stalls are counted in, whether or not they are legally established, but they are objective; secondly, it is plausible that unauthorized persons are prohibited from publishing food safety information. In fact, it is easy to become a government to arbitrarily interfere with citizens’ communication freedom (including An even better excuse for freedom of the press on the Internet and the press freedom of the media. What's worse is that setting up “passwords” for the media and the public just happens to be a “guardian” for the government not to release food safety information in a timely manner – please forgive citizens. This mistrust of the government is the norm in any society ruled by law. Otherwise, the law does not need to supervise the government.

A healthy and reasonable system should be to find a proper balance between the above rights and obligations: When questions about food safety arise, what the government should do is to proactively release food safety risk information before the rumor arises, including : Probability of side effects that may be caused by additives in foods; Recommended population for health foods, Recommended dietary methods, Probability of measurement, and the presence of side effects; For example, the residual safe dose and relative safety of food contained in soils, pesticides, fertilizers, etc. The total amount of food consumed by an individual within a unit of time, etc. Regarding the questioning of food safety by any individual, the government should reply to it in an open platform. If the government releases information timely enough and the interaction with the public can be carried out smoothly, not only the hidden dangers of food safety can be discovered more easily (through the government's initiative to supervise and receive reports from the public and promptly initiate investigations), but also the panic caused by food safety, and The confusion brought about by various types of rumors can also be greatly reduced or even avoided.