The United Nations recently commented that global food safety initiatives driven by government and big business is putting small companies and in particular developing countries' small businesses out of business.
At the heart of the issue is the balance of food safety and the regulations needed to improve the safety of food products. Additionally the drive is on to put the responsibility for food safety back on the producer and manufacturer.
The self regulation is being directed by lobbying groups for the food industry which are headed and funded by the large food companies. The rules being made push the small companies out and are self-supporting to large businesses.
To certify on the new programs requires training and documentation that are time consuming and expensive. The larger companies can train corporately and drive it out to each of the sub units. For the small company, the luxury of spreading the cost over many plants and large volume does not exist. Hence, the small company will not be able to compete and go out of business.
You might say, so what. Well, we want a large variety of food products at any time any where around the globe. Some of this comes from small suppliers in remote areas of the world.
Take the GFSI sweeping the EU, UK and USA. Two main accepted followings are BRC and SQF. The FMI has designed the program to only allow large training suppliers to play in the "sand box". This is because the program is very expensive. Small private inspection firms cannot compete in this arena, because the rules have been made to exclude them.
Our world economy was built on the small business. The large multiplant and international businesses grew by buying out the competition and as a large organization becoming less capable of making good decisions quickly. The economy of scale was economy of mediocrity and spreading of costs over a larger base.
As a small business owner, who wants our small producers and manufacturers to survive and our developing countries to better support their people, get big business and big government out of the control of decisions and return to common sense, ethics and personal initiative to solve our food safety and profitability issues.
Be safe...
Rudy Westervelt
rudy@powerinlearning.com
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Small businesses that manufacture children's products are running into a similar problem: the "Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act" or CPSIA. Sadly, the big businesses who have been the ones responsible for bringing unsafe toys into the U.S. will be able to afford to comply with the new act, but small companies who have dedicated their time and energies to safer alternatives for children will end up being run out of business because of it.
For more info: http://www.handmadetoyalliance.org/
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