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It has been said, what we know and what we believe is of little consequence. It is
what we do that is important. When it comes to food safety, this point is certainly
true.
The main reason I decided to write this book is simple. It’s because I wish I
could have known 20 years ago (when I started my career in food safety) what I
know now. The concepts I will share with you in this book are not generally
taught in food science curriculums. They are not something you generally hear
about in food safety seminars or at food safety conferences. To my knowledge,
there is not much documented in the food safety literature about this topic.
The concepts you’ll read about in this book are simple. Many are age-old
principles about human behavior. Others are more recent concepts developed
through the study of human behavior, group dynamics, and organizational
culture. Many of the ideas may be considered simple. They are so simple that
they are powerful. In fact, one of the most common compliments I receive is
that the ideas presented in this text are simple, but they are rarely assembled
together in this manner and they are rarely used in the context of improved food
safety performance.
In the field of food safety today, there is much documented about specific
microbes, time/temperature processes, post-process contamination, and
HACCP – things often called the hard sciences. There is not much published
or discussed related to human behavior and culture – often referred to as the
‘‘soft stuff.’’
However, if you look at foodborne disease trends over the past few decades,
it’s clear to me that the soft stuff is still the hard stuff.We won’t make dramatic
improvements in reducing the global burden of foodborne disease, especially in
certain parts of the food system and world, until we get much better at influencing
and changing human behavior (the soft stuff). |
