Innovative and Participatory Risk-Based Approaches to Assess Milk-Safety in Developing Countries: a case study in North East India

Food safety is a major problem and of increasing concern in developing countries. Risk-based approaches are current best practice but have been little applied. We present a case-study from Assam, North East India, illustrating 3 key elements of risk-based approaches in the context of the informal dairy sector. We used risk-based targeting to categorise milk vendors into a risk hierarchy, thus allowing vendors which pose most risk to human health to be identified and inspection and intervention directed accordingly. We also describe pathway analysis, in which the food product is traced from production on farm to consumption. This helps identify critical control points where action can, and must, be taken to avoid risk to human health. In Assam, the last step of the pathway (house-to-house vendor to consumer) was where risk increased most for raw milk; while, for milk sweets the holding time of the prepared sweet was critical. Participatory risk analysis posits that building on indigenous knowledge will be more effective than top-down solutions and we looked at indigenous risk management that is the existing practices that reduce risk. We found a range of good practices among all actors. Consumers had the highest level of good practice. We also examined the relation between good practice and low bacterial counts and were able to identify the practice most associated with safe production. This case study shows that risk-based approaches can be usefully applied in informal markets in developing countries.