In an annual poll conducted by food safety data crunching outfit Food Sentry, the nations of the world are ranked in order of the number of food safety violations.
The recently released top 10 worst offenders list names the leaders (or losers) as follows: India, China, Mexico, France, the US, Vietnam, Brazil, Dominican Republic, Turkey, and Spain.
Understanding food safety
According to Food Sentry’s senior intelligence analyst Zak Solomon, breaking down such data is vital for food professionals to be aware of and comprehend.
“Clearly understanding food safety from a global perspective is immensely important,” he said. “Food safety violations are nothing new; they've just been receiving a lot of attention lately, and rightly so.”
According to Food Sentry, the company scoured food industry data from 12 months’ worth of reports. Their staff dug into data from government entities in the US, Europe, and Japan, and other sources.
Top offenders
While developing countries have their share of food safety violations, Solomon pointed out the top 10 worst offending countries includes mostly first-world leaders.
"We import from every single one of the countries in the top ten, and, in fact, the U.S. is among the most common violators,” he said.
The poll reports the most frequently listed food safety violation was “excessive or illegal pesticide contamination.” Such infractions reportedly comprised more than a third of all the violations recorded.
Food Sentry is an organization designed to provide food professionals and consumers with information about food product safety.