J.P. Suarez on the role of the GFSI

J.P. Suarez, Senior Vice President and General Counsel for Walmart Stores International and chairman of the Global Food Safety Initiative (GFSI), talked to the 700 person Global Food Safety Conference audience about what the GFSI does and does not do.

On what the GFSI does, he said,

I think that cost efficiency is one of the key aspects of GFSI, and the rationales behind GFSI, and quite candidly, I’m not sure we are there yet and we need to make sure that cost efficiency is one of our objectives, continues be realised, without compromising the quality of food safety inspections and audits that we do in our factories and in our plants and in our farms.

On what the GFSI does NOT do, JP added,

GFSI does not make policy for retailers or manufacturers, those companies do. We don’t make policy for the standard owners, we do not undertake at GFSI any independent accreditation or certification activities.