Magazines Archives - 2009 November

Study: Retailers need to lead the way in food safety
Story 13 - Food Biz Area

Leading retailers in the region need to take on a more active role in ensuring food freshness and safety from farm to fork, as demand for fresh and safe food in Asia continues to grow. According to the study, entitled Safer Fresh Food for Asia’s Shoppers — A Call to Action, commissioned by the Coca-Cola Retailing Research Council Asia (CCRR CA), Asian shoppers “go to extraordinary lengths to seek out freshness in the marketplace”.

As a result of this “yearning for freshness”, the business consequences of spoilage or even a single food-safety incident can be catastrophic, it noted.

“Consumers in Asia have high expectations for very fresh and affordable products. The connection between fresh categories and customer loyalty is more powerful in Asia than anywhere,” said
Mark Van Dyck, group director of Customer Leadership at Coca-Cola Pacific.

Tracing the evolution of Asian markets in relation to the level of food safety, the study also pointed out that countries which have achieved a higher level of food safety worked closely with their
retailers to implement these measures.

Segmenting the region into developed, developing and emerging markets, the study gave detail descriptions of areas of concern in each market, and shared some of the practices that
retailers in developed markets had implemented, in collaboration with their respective governments and regulatory boards.

Carmelito Regalado, director merchandising& marketing, Matahari Food business, is quoted in the study as saying: “By adopting practices of retailers in neighbouring markets at similar or
more advanced stages of development, retailers will be well positioned to better configure their fresh food-safety practices to fit their present market context and shape tomorrow’s context.”

The study identified three main threats to food safety in Asian retailers’ supply chains, namely residual
chemicals, microbe contamination and spoilage, and veterinary disease. As these threats often escape the naked eye, the study also disclosed a simple and logical end-to-end framework that would give retailers better control of their supply chain and, ultimately, ensure food safety.

“[Retail] leaders must instil a mindset and culture that recognises how crucial freshness and food safety are to reputation and trust. They must develop action plans that go beyond their own
employees to include upstream supplychain partners, regulatory agencies and consumers,” it concluded.

The study, conducted by McKinsey & Company from October 2008 to July 2009, surveyed senior management and food-safety experts from 17 key retailers in the region.

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