CONCLUSION

            It is important to realize that the work in France, Germany, and other member states of the EU is not complete.  The President of the Comitè de Pilotage du Guide had these remarks about future endeavours in France,

            “our wish is henceforth to engage the profession to construct a ‘Guide of Good Hygienic Practices’ for dairy products and farm cheeses, according to Directive 93/43.  The guide will be directly operational in all types of farm cheese production.  It will give each producer the concrete elements to put in place a self-control approach for the sanitary quality of their products.  In addition, it will constitute a formalization and reconnaissance of the ‘savoir faire’ of farm cheese producers.  The guide will also act as a reference for officials and be equally well utilized in their agencies for their controls.”15

            The member states were required to encourage and participate in the development of these guides within 30 months of the adoption of Directive 93/43/EEC, which happened in France on September 5, 1995.  Producers who have total or partial exemption from the requirements of the community sanitary approval will need to comply with the provisions of the new guide when it is completed.

             The task of  implementing systems of self-regulation at all levels of production, transport, and sale of foods, let alone dairy products, is enormous.  The European Commission has recently adopted a proposal whose primary objective is to provide the basis for assuring a high level of protection of human health while ensuring the effective functioning of the internal market.16   The proposal sets down fundamental principles and requirements of food law and establishes a European Food Authority.  This appears to be part of the ongoing effort in the EU to harmonize approaches to food safety assurance. 

            The code of hygienic practice for milk and milk products being drafted by the Codex Alimentarius Committee on Food Hygiene is still at step 3 of the eight-step process.  The code is used as a reference for member states in creating the guides of hygienic practice.  The assessment of the risks from different dairy products is a key issue in the drafting process.  At this stage, the draft code allows individual countries to manufacture dairy products in whatever manner they desire and to establish their own level of public health protection.17

            An ongoing debate in the Codex Committee on Food Hygiene concerns effective ways of carrying out risk assessments on microbiological hazards to create standards that are achievable by producers of traditional products and producers in developing countries. [17]   In its report from 1997, the Codex Committee agreed to stress the importance of control measures at all stages of the food processing chain, from primary production to consumption.19   In the EU, the strength of the approach to place safe dairy products on the market lies in the use of self-controls by the producers of raw milk and other dairy foods with additional controls and verification of compliance performed by officials.  In each member state of the EU, risk assessment has been used to provide a sufficient level of protection for consumer health.  The evaluation of the risks associated with raw milk and products made from raw, thermized, and pasteurized milk  resulted in the formation of standards and protocols for analyzing the safety of these products.

            In France, the standards for raw milk and cheese and the frequency of analysis, which is linked to production levels, reflect the inherent health risks from microbiological hazards in farm cheese made by all producers, from the smallest to the largest.  Therefore, it can be said that, the regulatory system in France directly reflects the French cultural interpretation of risk from the consumption of raw milk and cheese.  The German regulations for raw milk and cheese are similar to those in France but stricter standards for Vorzugsmilch, which is raw milk intended for direct consumption and sold as a retail product, indicate a slightly different interpretation of risk from the French.