Food defense is the protection of food products from intentional contamination or adulteration by biological, chemical, physical, or radiological agents introduced for the purpose of causing harm. It addresses additional concerns including physical, personnel and operational security.
Food defense is one of the four categories of the food protection risk matrix which include: food safety, which is based on unintentional or environmental contamination that can cause harm; Food fraud, which is based on intentional deception for economic gain; and Food quality, which may also be affected by profit-driven behavior but without intention to cause harm.
Overarching these four categories is food security, which deals with individuals having access to enough food for an active, healthy life. Food protection is the umbrella term encompassing both food defense and food safety. These six terms are often conflated.
Along with protecting the food system, food defense also deals with prevention, protection, mitigation, response and recovery from intentional acts of adulteration.
History in the United States
1906: The Federal Meat Inspection Act places requirements on the slaughter, processing and labeling of meat and meat products, domestic and imported. 1938: The Federal Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act establishes definitions and regulation for the safety of food, drugs, and cosmetics. 1957: The Poultry Products Inspection Act requires the Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) to inspect all domesticated birds meant for human consumption. November 2002: The Homeland Security Act passed by congress creates the Department of Homeland Security in response to the September 11 attacks. December 2003: Homeland Security Presidential Directive 7 establishes a policy to identify and prioritize critical infrastructures. Food and Agriculture is identified as one of these infrastructures January 2004: The Homeland Security Presidential Directive 9 establishes policy to protect agriculture and food systems against terrorist attacks. January 2004: DHS launches Homeland Security Centers of Excellence in order to conduct research to address homeland security challenges. July 2004: The National Center for Food Protection and Defense now Food Protection and Defense Institute (FPDI) is formally launched with the vision to "defend the safety of the food system through research and education" at the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities. January 2011: The Food Safety Modernization Act grants the FDA new authorities and powers, as well as directly providing for protections against intentional adulteration.
Food defense event types
Food defense events can generally be categorized into three types. These could be carried out by a disgruntled employee, sophisticated insider, or intelligent adversary with a specific goal in mind. This goal may be to impact the public, brand, company or the psycho-social stability of a group of people depending on the type. However an event may contain aspects of more than one category.
Industrial sabotage
These events include intentional contamination by a disgruntled employee, insider or competitor with the intention of damaging the brand of the company, causing financial problems from a widespread recall or sabotage, but not necessarily with the goal of causing widespread illness or public harm. These internal actors often know what procedures are followed in the plant, and how to bypass checkpoints and security controls.
An example of a disgruntled employee is the contamination of frozen foods produced by a subsidiary of Maruha Nichiro with malathion, a pesticide. The contamination resulted in a recall of 6.4 million potentially tainted products. Nearly 1,800 people are estimated to have been affected, and public confidence in food quality was shaken.
Terrorism
The reach and complexity of the food system has caused concern for its potential as a terrorist target.
The first and largest food attack in the US is the 1984 Rajneeshee bioterror attack. 751 individuals were poisoned in The Dalles, Oregon through the contamination of salad bars with Salmonella with the intention of affecting the 1984 Wasco County elections.