Wiley Handbook of Science and Technology for Homeland Security, 4 Volume Set

PROCESSING AND PACKAGING THAT PROTECTS THE FOOD SUPPLY AGAINST INTENTIONAL CONTAMINATION

SCOTT A. MORRIS

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, Illinois

1 INTRODUCTION

Too often, the first reaction to a social problem is to attempt to find a technical solution, when technology cannot overcome social problems, only their means and circumstances. Although there are some processing and packaging steps that can be taken to indicate intentional contamination of food, it is not possible to add a simple, inexpensive component to existing systems to prevent a determined attack: real solutions are always imperfect, often more complex and usually more difficult.

Quite apart from malicious human efforts, nature has been attempting to contaminate food products since the first drying and salting of grains, meats and vegetables provided for a longer-duration food supply, and most food processing operations have a culture of quality that is intrinsically designed to work against these threats. Many of the efforts in large-scale food contamination have been directed at detection of outbreaks of food poisoning in the population and then remediation after an outbreak occurs. The food industry, which is usually quite careful about quality and safety, already has coding and recall management practices in place. These have historically worked very well after problems are detected, but assume that the producer is acting in good faith; that the inspection, notification and recall systems ...