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This paper aims to present Campden BRI’s viewpoint on the implementation of the Culture Excellence Program, which includes an assessment tool that measures the safety and quality culture within food businesses. It is the seventh paper in a theme issue of Worldwide Hospitality and Tourism Themes, discussing the importance of measuring food safety and quality culture.

A viewpoint is put forward by the Campden BRI Head of Membership and Training, supported by the results from a global training survey which was sent to over 25,000 food businesses worldwide by Campden BRI and collaborating companies.

Food safety and quality culture is of increasing importance to Campden BRI members and the food industry as a whole. It is seen as one of the main purposes of training, and as a means of measuring the effectiveness of training. The Culture Excellence Program has met with a highly positive reaction from Campden BRI industry members, showing the importance and value of culture and its measurement.

This paper shows insights into trends in the food industry within the UK and globally. It will be of value to food safety and quality practitioners, trainers, auditors and other stakeholders involved in the food industry.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the relationships between supply chain quality management (SCQM) and firm performance (including quality safety performance and sales performance) leveraging social co-regulation as a moderator.

Using survey data collected from 203 food manufacturers in China, a series of hierarchical linear modeling analyses were conducted to test hypotheses on the relationships between SCQM and firm performance.

The findings are threefold. First, all three dimensions of food SCQM practices, i.e., supplier quality management, internal quality management, and customer quality management, have significant positive effects on an enterprise's quality safety performance and sales performance. Second, SCQM practices can also increase sales performance indirectly through quality safety performance as a mediator. Third, while social co-regulation has no significant effect on the relationship between supplier quality management and quality safety performance, it has a significant moderating effect on the relationship between internal quality management and quality safety performance, customer quality management and quality safety performance.

This study not only integrates SCQM with social co-regulation but also explores the regulating effect of social co-regulation through empirical analysis, thereby providing a theoretical base for future research. However, this research is confined to China and so the results are not necessarily generalizable to other countries.

The findings inform managers of the importance in enhancing awareness of food quality and safety as well as in improving their sensitivity to salient quality demands of external stakeholders in order to achieve better SCQM practices. The findings can also inform policymakers of the significance in designing a systematic multi-agent cooperation mechanism for food SCQM as well as to build an effective information sharing mechanism for social co-regulation of food safety.

This study contributes to knowledge by empirically examining the relationships of SCQM practices with firm performance. It also expands the scope of SCQM research by incorporating social co-regulation in the study framework.

Food markets are characterized by asymmetric information between suppliers and consumers, which causes inefficiency of market and food safety risks. This paper studies how the food quality and safety information disclosed by the government affects the hazard analysis and critical control point (HACCP) certification decision of meat producers. The heterogeneity of the effects across different regions, provinces with different meat output scales and provinces with different intensities of food safety regulation is evaluated.

This paper applies a unique database comprising information from multiple sources. Food quality and safety information disclosure is indicated by the number of failure records of food sampling inspections by the government in 2015–2018. Fixed-effect model is used in the analyses.

The results demonstrate that food quality and safety information disclosure has a significant effect on the HACCP certification adoption by meat producers. The effect is heterogeneous across geographic regions, i.e. this effect is larger in the east and the middle of China than that in the west and the northeast. The heterogeneity across regions may be caused by the variance in meat output scales and fiscal expenditures on food safety among provinces.

This research is one of the preliminary attempts to understand how producers respond in terms of HACCP certification to the amount of food quality and safety information disclosed by the government, based on the case of meat industry in China.

The research presented here aims to gain understanding of consumers' perceptions of the concepts of food quality and safety, two concepts that play an important role in how consumers perceive food, and that are used in decision making.

Qualitative semi‐structured interviews (n=163 consumers) were held in four European countries (Germany, France, Italy and Spain). Consumers' own definitions of the two concepts of food quality and safety were examined, together with the perceived interrelationship between quality and safety, and whether these concepts were linked to improved food chain traceability.

The results indicate that most consumers see food quality and food safety as interlinked concepts, which becomes evident in their partly overlapping definitions of the two concepts. Consumers believe both food safety and quality are important to food in general, but pay relatively more attention to food quality when purchasing a product. Traceability was linked not only to food safety, but also to food quality in the mind of the consumer.

Future research on consumer perceptions of food quality and safety will need to take account of the observation that these concepts are strongly related in consumers' minds, and therefore cannot be easily separated in explaining consumer choices.

Instead of investigating consumer perceptions of food quality and safety in relation to specific products, consumer perceptions of food quality and food safety in general, and how these were related to each other, were studied. Further understanding was gained of how consumers might use these concepts in judgements about food, which, in turn may influence their purchase decisions.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the key requirements of the Food Safety Modernization Act (FSMA), recently passed by the US Congress to safeguard the nation's food supply, and to ascertain the role of quality professionals in the management of food safety and quality systems for food facilities.

Since genesis of the Act emanates mainly from the recent upsurge in food disease outbreaks in North America, key lessons learnt from the 2008 Listeriosis outbreak in Canada were reviewed. Thereafter, a case study of developing a food safety and quality management system for a “very low risk facility” – i.e. a third party warehouse – was considered. Finally, potential connections between the sections of the FSMA and roles of various quality practitioners were discussed.

Recent study at the third party logistics warehouse revealed developing and implementing pre‐requisite programs (PRPs), i.e. mainly operational and physical controls, had a positive impact on the food safety and quality management system (FSQMS). Hence, quality practitioners may focus on PRPs to enhance compliance to FSMA requirements.

Food production, processing, packaging and/or distribution companies that export their products to the USA, as well as enterprises requiring preventive controls to ensure food safety and quality, can greatly benefit from the services of quality practitioners. Other key inputs the practitioners provide to the FSQMS include costs reduction, value addition, defects prevention, process control, maintenance and improvement.

The paper closely studies quality practitioners’ perspectives towards meeting or even exceeding the new food safety regulatory expectations in food‐related institutions.

This study used the literature review and the modified Delphi method to evaluate the importance of the catering quality indices of university canteens in China. In order to compile the catering quality indices of university canteens in China as reference for the subsequent improvement of Chinese canteens.

This study first analysed literature data to establish the preliminary quality indices and used the modified Delphi method for measurement. After three rounds of Delphi analysis by 35 experts, the results of the catering quality indices of university canteens in China are summarised.

The research results show that university canteen catering quality issues are divided into six dimensions, including catering safety management, employee hygiene management, catering service, food quality, environmental atmosphere and corporate social responsibility. Catering safety management is the most important index, followed by employee hygiene management.

The research results can be used as suggestions for follow-up improvements in the quality of university canteens in China and a basis of reference for amendments to relevant national or local laws and regulations. The food prices, food quality and whether food hygiene and safety standards are met by university canteens are all related to the health and vital interests of the teachers and students, as well as the stability of the university. Therefore, the government should increase supervision in these aspects to avoid decline in the quality of meals due to low profits and enforce strict requirements for food safety.

This study aims to examine the factors shaping food firms’ intentions to control quality safety in the context of government regulation in China.

Based on 180 usable data samples collected via a survey, structural equation modeling and moderated multiple regression analysis were used to examine the research model.

It was found that quality safety capability, corporate social responsibility, collaboration between parties along supply chains and information-sharing among supply chain members have had different impacts on the intentions of food firms to control quality safety. It was also found that government regulation has a positive moderating effect on corporate social responsibility and on collaboration between organizations in a supply chain.

This research is limited to a particular sample: i.e. the managers of food firms from Guangdong Province in China. Thus, the results need to be generalized to encompass wider samples.

Previous studies have not explained well the mechanisms by which quality safety control has been established among China’s food firms. This study builds a theoretical framework for the factors affecting intentions to control quality safety by examining issues from the perspectives of food firms and by taking into account the characteristics of food supply chains. This approach addresses the gaps in current understanding and provides practical support to promote quality safety among food firms in China.

The purpose of this paper is to describe the 16-year research and development journey of the Culture Excellence assessment tool, which is used widely to assess safety and quality culture in the food industry. It is the third article in a theme issue of Worldwide Hospitality and Tourism Themes, discussing the importance of measuring food safety and quality culture.

An iterative process of in-depth interviews and mixed-method case studies led to the development of a conceptual model and an online assessment tool, which are used to gain insight into safety and quality culture.

The research process resulted in a conceptual model of four categories and 20 dimensions of safety and quality culture, alongside a practical online assessment tool to enable their measurement; these categories and dimensions are demonstrated using qualitative quotations.

This paper introduces qualitative data on safety and quality culture direct from the food industry with academic analysis to highlight new dimensions and issues. It will be of value to food safety and quality practitioners, trainers, auditors and other stakeholders involved in the food industry.

The purpose of this paper is to develop an integrative model where perceived competence, perceived warmth and “clean green image” of an exporting country are drivers for Chinese consumers' trust in food quality and food safety, which in turn predict their willingness to buy fresh fruit from this country.

Participants (N = 1,583) from the three metropolises in China were surveyed on their perceptions of the competence, warmth and clean green image of seven contrasting exporting countries and their trust in quality, trust in safety and willingness to buy fresh fruit imported from those countries.

Results support the proposed integrative model, explaining 39%–55% of the variance in willingness to buy. Clean green image was the strongest predictor of willingness to buy through enhanced trust in food quality. The effects of country competence and warmth on willingness to buy through trust in food safety and quality varied with exporting country.

The integrative model and findings of this study can help agri-food industries develop an in-depth understanding of Chinese consumers and to develop targeted strategies to increase willingness to buy through improving consumer trust in food quality and safety.

This study extends the country image framework which previously only consisted of human characteristics (i.e. perceived competence and warmth) by incorporating environmental characteristics (i.e. clean green image) in examining consumers' willingness to buy imported fresh fruit.

Frequent food safety incidents caused widespread consumer concerns. Even though food safety is one of the weakest links in the fresh food supply chain and influences consumer food choice in ways different from the quality dimension, this factor is hardly proposed as one of the key traditional supplier selection criteria (e.g. quality, delivery, and price) in the literature. The purpose of this paper is to develop a business process decision model to assess the non-compensating food safety sub-criteria in order to disqualify fresh food suppliers that cannot reach the minimum threshold for low probable food safety failure. The preferred fresh food suppliers can minimize the risk of food safety failure and the associated huge food safety failure costs spanning from private consumer anguish to social distress that cause unbearable costs of sales loss and damage to brand image in business.

This study proposes a novel approach that combines several well-established multi-criteria decision making (MCDM) techniques, including fuzzy AHP (FAHP), TOPSIS, and ELECTRE, and innovatively apply to analyze supplier performance and prioritize potential fresh food suppliers. This hybrid business process model can enforce compliance to all the five non-compensatory sub-criteria of food safety. Since ELECTRE is a non-compensatory MCDM method, it is therefore particularly applicable for disqualifying high risk fresh food suppliers from further full scale supplier performance evaluation by FAHP and TOPSIS. This hybrid business process decision model is able to capitalize on the strengths of these MCDM methods and offset their deficiencies.

This study uses data of an international supermarket chain to validate feasibility of the proposed model. Results indicate that this model is able to assess the non-compensating food safety sub-criteria via the ELECTRE method in order to disqualify fresh food suppliers that cannot reach the minimum threshold for low probable food safety failure. Only the preferred suppliers with the required food safety capability can proceed to the second stage of the supplier selection process. Assessment via the TOPSIS method reveals the ranking order of those top performing suppliers according to their relative scores along all the supplier selection criteria. The TOPSIS ranking results with the selection of the suppliers C, E, A, and F are robust and consistent across all the different scenarios.

Application to the fresh food industry is possible with the aid of the MCDM methods. The contribution to the body of knowledge in this teaching and research field demonstrates the importance of first identifying the order qualifier for disqualifying those suppliers that do not satisfy the food safety requirements via the ELECTRE method. The proposed assessment procedure complies with the regulatory policy on food safety, and would influence public policy in applying the best practice of food safety regulation. Without first qualifying the potential suppliers on the basis of food safety, wrong decision can be made to select those high food risk suppliers that have relatively higher overall scores in other supplier selection criteria. Using the assessment results has positive economic and commercial impact on the purchasing managers to formulate appropriate purchasing and supplier development strategy to enhance supplier’s food safety performance, whilst maximizing the overall supplier portfolio performance. The improved supplier’s food safety performance will certainly benefit the society’s quality of life as well.

Based on the analytical MCDM methods of FAHP, TOPSIS, and ELECTRE, purchasing managers can operationalize the Hill’s framework of order qualifier and winner that has primarily been used in the literature and manufacturing industry. This study represents the first move to innovatively apply the FAHP, TOPSIS, and ELECTRE methods to operationalize the Hill’s framework of order qualifier and winner that has primarily been used in the literature and manufacturing industry. Application to the fresh food industry to validate the feasibility of the proposed model has been conceived and implemented in this study. Analysis of the data inputs of a supermarket chain via the three MCDM methods generate the results that fulfill the purpose of achieving the research objective of identifying and managing the supplier base that can deliver the best supplier performance, conditional on first passing the fresh food safety test.