Dive Brief:
- Manufacturers cannot depend on testing alone to prove the safety of their products, according to food safety experts during a webinar sponsored by the Produce Marketing Association.
- Experts said that testing can provide a false sense of security through easily attainable false negatives, which could occur based on a test's ability to detect pathogens and the size of the test sample.
- The experts cautioned that safety testing can be "used as a marketing advantage" to calm consumers' concerns rather being a guarantee that a company's products are safe.
Dive Insight:
This could be a blow to product testing startups, which have popped up en masse over the past few years, specializing in everything from DNA testing to immunoassay-based techniques to promote faster and/or more accurate safety test results.
Out of concern for consumer backlash and an increased need for transparency, manufacturers have turned to product testing companies, including these startups, to generate results that prove safety protocols are effective.
However, if manufacturers depend on product safety testing and products still end up causing an outbreak, this could put the product testing industry and companies' transparency efforts in jeopardy.
Food safety testing companies will still play an important role, even if manufacturers have to find other ways to complement safety testing results to ensure products are in fact safe for consumption.