Food safety and transparency in food chains and networks - Relationships and challenges

European consumers are worried about the safety of their food. These concerns are caused by a continuing sequence of food scandals and incidents during the last decade. In response, consumers call for high quality food, food integrity, safety guarantees and transparency. Governments are imposing new legislation. Retailers are imposing new demands on their supply chains. Food supply chains react by implementing systems to improve the product's quality and guarantee its safety, at the same time making transparent that they do so. Such actions can be taken at the level of either the individual company or the complete network of supply chains. We describe the challenges involved in achieving food safety and transparency by cooperating in the supply chain network. To this end, we elaborate on a real world case in an SME environment. (C) 2004 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.