Food safety assurance systems in China

China's food industry grows fast since 1980s, with an average annual growth rate over 13%. Likewise the frequent outbreak of food-borne illness in China makes evident the deficiency of food safety assurance systems. The paper discussed food safety assurance systems in China. Specifically, the paper firstly introduced China's food industry, food safety status and origin, food safety regulation agencies, and then compared two kinds of food safety assurance systems applied in China, in particular their market objectives, functions, management modes and resulting constraint forces on food producers, etc. (c) 2006 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.