Victorian Auditor-General’s report
14 March 2012

Agricultural Food Safety
Audit summary
Agricultural food safety involves the primary production and processing of raw agricultural products. This encompasses activities on farms, during transportation, and at the facilities involved in processing and handling raw products.
Food safety risks can arise from poor management practices at any stage of the supply chain, such as poor controls over the use of chemicals and veterinary medicines and problems with facilities, hygiene, temperature control and handling practices of food items. 
Australia has a national framework for food regulation, which includes food safety. The framework is established through an intergovernmental agreement between the Australian, state and territory governments and delivered through uniform national food standards.
In Victoria, a mix of regulation, education, advice and research are used to manage food safety risks and implement the national Food Standards Code. The Department of Health (DOH), Department of Primary Industries (DPI), Dairy Food Safety Victoria (DFSV) and PrimeSafe all have important responsibilities for supporting Victoria’s agricultural food safety system. 
Conclusions
Agricultural food safety is being effectively managed, supported by the three regulators—DPI, DFSV and PrimeSafe—actively monitoring and enforcing compliance with regulations and food safety standards. Audit examinations show they apply their policies and procedures consistently and have sound controls in place for managing the quality of this work.
As with any area of public sector activity, there are areas for improvement in regulatory approaches. Importantly, there are opportunities for regulators to be able to demonstrate more clearly the effectiveness of regulatory activities. 
Across the three regulators, assurance about the effectiveness and impact of their activities is incomplete because they do not have clear performance measures or benchmarks defining what they expect effective performance to achieve. This limits their ability to attribute their regulatory work to positive food safety outcomes in Victoria. This is also the case for the performance of the food safety system as a whole.

Findings
Managing compliance with food safety regulation
To regulate effectively, the agencies regulating agricultural food safety need to have clear food safety rules and requirements. They also need to efficiently and effectively administer and enforce them. This involves supporting businesses to understand and apply the requirements, monitoring how well businesses comply with them and applying sanctions to serious compliance breaches. 
Generally, the three agencies are managing compliance well. There are clear rules and requirements for agricultural production and processing businesses to manage food safety.
DFSV and PrimeSafe have sound, risk-based processes for monitoring compliance, managing non-compliance with food safety requirements and using their enforcement powers. Each is generally consistent in applying them. These are effective approaches, given generally high compliance rates, low incidence of repeat offenders and rare need to prosecute. While DPI has risk-based processes for monitoring compliance and managing non‑compliance and enforcement, its approach to monitoring chemical use compliance needs to be strengthened.  
DOH has primary responsibility for food safety incident response, whether it is an incident relating to the agricultural food safety stream or the manufacturing, retail and food service stream. The audit examination of recent incidents showed DOH communicated clearly and frequently with other agencies, sought advice and information and used its enforcement powers as a last resort. Recent national reviews of three incidents did not highlight any issues particular to Victoria.
Nevertheless, these actions cannot be assessed against a clearly defined incident response framework. DOH has policies and procedures for managing incidents, but there is no guidance on how they link together to form a seamless response. In addition, important details such as the criteria for escalating the level of response, and who makes some decisions, are lacking. Because of the lack of documentation, it was not evident whether DOH did all it should have to manage the risk that key people were not involved in incident response, that poorly informed decisions were made, or that unnecessary delays occurred at a time when good advice, clear thinking and quick responses were needed most. 
Measuring and reporting performance
While undertaking compliance and enforcement activities is a key element of an effective regulatory regime, regulators also need to know whether they are delivering their programs as intended, consistent with their policies and procedures. To determine this, they should use quality assurance processes, such as accredited quality management systems and internal audit. 
Agencies should also be routinely reporting on their performance to demonstrate how effectively and efficiently they are operating, and to indicate where improvement is needed. Effective performance reporting supports accountability, but this relies on agencies having relevant and measurable performance measures that show whether or not they are meeting their objectives and achieving their outcomes. 
DFSV, PrimeSafe and DPI all have sound approaches for reviewing the way they deliver their policies and procedures, and using the results to improve their performance. However, none have sufficient performance information to assure themselves on either the quality of their performance or the food safety benefits they deliver. 
None of the regulators have clear measures, targets or benchmarks defining what they expect effective performance to achieve. Public reporting on compliance with Victoria’s agricultural food safety regulatory framework remains minimal. While there is some reporting on complaints and prosecutions, there is little available on compliance or trends in performance over time. There is little similarity in reporting between agencies, making it difficult to assess performance across the agricultural sector.
There is also no statewide food safety performance reporting framework despite this office in 2002 and 2005 and the Victorian Competition and Efficiency Commission in 2005 and 2007 recommending that better performance reporting is needed to provide public accountability for the food safety system’s effectiveness. Public reporting across the system almost exclusively describes activities and rarely demonstrates how these contribute to achieving goals or objectives.
Coordinating and overseeing regulatory and compliance effort
Victoria’s food safety system involves multiple agencies—including the food safety regulators—implementing the national food regulation framework through a number of state-based risk and compliance management tools. To be effective, the system needs to be supported by effective coordination and oversight, shared purpose and goals, and a clear understanding of system-wide risks.
Victoria’s food safety system is part of the national food regulation framework and involves all the appropriate agencies in implementing the national food standards. While the Committee of Food Regulators (CFR) provides an effective coordinating role, the system’s effectiveness in driving improved food safety outcomes is weakened by the narrow focus of the CFR’s draft strategic plan, unclear accountability for achieving the plan, and an absence of information about the performance of the food safety system. Accountability for achieving the plan needs to be determined, and CFR’s 2012 review of its operations and effectiveness provides a timely opportunity to do this. 
Recommendations
Number	Recommendation	Page	
1.	The Department of Primary Industries should strengthen its risk-based rationale for monitoring chemical use compliance and how it analyses results and uses this to improve compliance.	24	
2.	The Department of Health should develop a food safety incident response plan that describes how its policies and procedures link together, supported by policies and procedures that are specific about what the criteria for action are, what needs to be done and who is responsible.	24	
3.	The Department of Primary Industries, Dairy Food Safety Victoria and PrimeSafe should include more comprehensive performance data in their public reports, with clear links between objectives, performance measures and performance data.	25	
4.	The Committee of Food Regulators should develop a performance reporting framework for Victoria’s food safety system, identifying the performance measures, data and public reporting that will provide assurance of food safety outcomes and the performance of the system. 	25	
5.	The Department of Primary Industries should clarify its role in regulating and managing agricultural food safety and integrate this work more strongly into the broader food safety system.	25	
6.	When reviewing its operations and effectiveness in 2012, the Committee of Food Regulators should definitively assign accountability for the success of the strategic plan and for agency-specific actions to support the strategic plan.	25	
7.	The Committee of Food Regulators should expand the strategic plan to: 
·	include a common strategic direction for food safety outcomes across the food supply chain from agricultural production to consumer
·	identify statewide objectives, desired outcomes, performance indicators and targets for food safety, in addition to the regulatory goals already included
·	be based on a clear program logic for how actions will contribute to achieving regulatory goals and food safety outcomes
·	assign responsibilities and resources for delivering the actions required to achieve the objectives
·	encompass all food safety agencies, including the Department of Primary Industries.	25	
8.	Victoria’s overall food safety system should include a framework for reviewing and prioritising risks across all food sectors and agencies, selecting the best approaches for managing the significant risks, and allocating regulatory, advisory and surveillance efforts.	25	
Submissions and comments received
In addition to progressive engagement during the course of the audit, in accordance with section 16(3) of the Audit Act 1994 a copy of this report was provided to the Department of Primary Industries, the Department of Health, Dairy Food Safety Victoria, PrimeSafe and the Victorian Committee of Food Regulators with a request for submissions or comments.
Agency views have been considered in reaching our audit conclusions and are represented to the extent relevant and warranted in preparing this report. Their full section 16(3) submissions and comments however, are included in Appendix A.