采用食品安全的私人激励和质量保证(英文)(pdf 15页)

Abstract
The competitiveness of food companies in national and international markets depends upon
their ability to adopt production processes which meet food safety and quality requirements.
Food safety and quality assurance affect the cost of carrying out transactions, and therein lies
the private incentive for adopting voluntary quality assurance systems. While quality assurance
systems have the potential to reduce transaction costs by serving as the seller’s guarantee of
safety or quality, they may also serve as trade barriers. Ó 1999 Elsevier Science Ltd. All
rights reserved.
Keywords: ISO 9000; Transaction costs; Trade barriers; Quality system; Food safety
Introduction
Governments enact and administratively determine ex ante national-level food
legislation and technical requirements for food processing, handling and production
processes, as well as ex post product liability law. These food safety technical
requirements and liability laws are, of course, incentives for firms to adopt appropriate
production processes and methods. In addition to the incentives driven by food
and liability law, private incentives drive firms to move beyond adopting approved
practices that meet technical requirements towards adopting quality assurance prac-……
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