Food Safety: A Patchwork System

This article, which appeared in the GAO Journal, No. 15, Spring/Summer 1992, presents suggestions on how to reform the inefficient, cumbersome, and costly federal regulatory structure for ensuring food safety, focusing on the present system's: (1) lack of coordination among federal agencies involved in food safety; (2) incongruities in inspection, certification, and regulatory approaches; (3) bureaucracy; and (4) failure to keep pace with regulatory needs posed by new food-borne threats, technological advances for food production, and changed consumer behavior.