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USDA, along with other Federal agencies, has responsibility for many regulatory programs and non-regulatory initiatives to assure a safe and affordable food supply. ERS research helps decisionmakers assess the effectiveness of proposed and current programs by providing economic analyses of their costs, benefits, and the distribution of benefits and costs across the population.


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A woman shopping for meats.Managing for Safer Food: The Economics of Sanitation and Process Controls in Meat and Poultry Plants—Sanitation and process controls raised the costs of producing meat and poultry by about 0.5 percent under food safety standards prior to the 1996 Pathogen Reduction Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Point (PR/HACCP) rule. There was no benefit, however, in trying to avoid these food safety quality control costs before 1996, since plants with poor performance records were more likely to exit their industry. Estimates also suggest that PR/HACCP raised production costs by about 1 percent, but that benefits of HACCP still outweigh costs. The article, Weighing Incentives for Food Safety in Meat and Poultry, in the April 2003 issue of Amber Waves highlights these findings, showing how more stringent regulation and changes in the marketplace have improved food safety, despite the rise in meat and poultry recalls.

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updated: May 14, 2003

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Meat and Poultry Plants' Food Safety Investments: Survey Findings

Food Safety Innovation in the United States: Evidence from the Meat Industry

Amber Waves, April 2004

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HACCP Survey Results

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