Canadian Coalition Wants on PM's Agenda

by Dan Flynn
Food Safety News, Marler Clark
Jan 31, 2010

The Canadian Supply Chain Food Safety Coalition is asking Prime Minister
Stephen Harper for a new round of consultations between Ministers of
Health, Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada and the agri-food industry.

The ten-year old Coalition, which represents all segments of the food
chain, said it "anticipates that food safety initiatives will be
included in the upcoming Speech from the Throne."

That March 2nd speech opens Parliament in Canada. It will set the
Conservative government's agenda. 

The Canadian Supply Chain Food Safety Coalition told Harper In a Jan.
28th letter that it would like "to bring to the consultations table" an
initiative based on four guiding principals. The four principles are:

1. Food safety is a shared responsibility of all participants in
the supply chain (input suppliers, businesses involved with production,
processing, manufacturing, importing, distribution, retailing and
marketing of food), all levels of government, and consumers.
2. Governments at all levels, the agri-food industry, and other
stakeholders should foster and facilitate the development of an
integrated, co-coordinated, and national approach to food safety policy
and regulation based on sound scientific risk assessment and risk
management principles and on international standards.
3. Industry and government food safety initiatives should encourage
the implementation of HACCP and/or HACCP-based food safety systems by
businesses all along the supply chain.
4. Food businesses, governments, and other stakeholders have a
responsibility to adequately resource, proactively manage, update,
maintain, and continually improve their individual and collaborative
food safety systems and food safety initiatives.

The Harper government is implementing all 57 recommendations from the
independent investigation of the 2008 Listeria outbreak from
contaminated ready-to-eat meats made by the Maple Leaf Foods plant in
Toronto. Last week, however, its food safety system led by the Canadian
Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) was under attack from labor and consumer
groups for not improving fast enough.

Food safety was not mentioned in President Obama's 70-minute State of
the Union speech to Congress. But in its letter to Harper, the
coalition says: "The expected passage of major reforms to food safety
legislation in the United States will significantly change the
regulatory environment in our continental food market."

In Canada, the Prime Minister writes the Speech from the Throne but
either the Queen or more typically her representative, the Governor
General, reads it. That means if food safety is on the PM's agenda, it
will very likely be in the speech.