Food Hygiene and Applied Food Microbiology in an Anthropological Cross Cultural Perspective

by Aleardo Zaccheo (Author), Morgan Venable (Author), Eleonora Palmaccio (Author)

• New

  Hardcover
  2016

  $125.99

  -The book demonstrates that food safety is a multidisciplinary scientific discipline that

  is specifically designed to prevent foodborne illness to consumers. It is generally assumed

  to be an axiom by both nonprofessionals and professionals alike, that the most

  developed countries, through their intricate and complex standards, formal trainings

  and inspections, are always capable of providing much safer food items and beverages

  to consumers as opposed to the lesser developed countries and regions of the world.

  Clearly, the available data regarding the morbidity and the mortality in different areas

  of the world confirms that in developing countries, the prevalence and the incidence of

  presumptive foodborne illness is much greater. However, other factors need to be taken

  into consideration in this overall picture: First of all, one of the key issues in developing

  countries appears to be the availability of safe drinking water, a key element in any

  food safety strategy. Second, the availability of healthcare facilities, care providers, and

  medicines in different parts of the world makes the consequences of foodborne illness

  much more important and life threatening in lesser developed countries than in most

  developed countries.

  It would be therefore ethnocentric and rather simplistic to state

  that the margin of improvement in food safety is only directly proportional to the

  level of development of the society or to the level of complexity of any given national

  or international standard. Besides standards and regulations, humans as a whole have

  evolved and adapted different strategies to provide and to ensure food and water safety

  according to their cultural and historical backgrounds. Our goal is to discuss and to

  compare these strategies in a cross-cultural and technical approach, according to the

  realities of different socio-economic, ethnical and social heritages.