From public to private safety regulation? The case of negotiated agreements in the French fresh produce import industry
by Jean-Marie Codron, M'hand Fares, Elodie Rouviere
International Journal of Agricultural Resources, Governance and Ecology (IJARGE), Vol. 6, No. 3, 2007

Abstract: Recent EU law of safety self-regulation by firms leads French fresh produce importers to negotiate with public authorities a collective self-monitoring safety agreement. This paper is a case study of such an agreement in the Perpignan import market. Its actual design poses a problem of incentive alignment as long as it does not fit in with theoretical conditions. Empirical evidence and two complementary bodies of the literature are used to deal with this issue. Firstly, drawing on the literature of incentive schemes in teams, we show that implementing a collective discipline within the group is highly unlikely. Secondly, by turning to the literature of voluntary approaches to food safety, we show that conditions for efficient enforcement are not met either. By introducing supermarkets as a third party we propose an enriched framework, which allows a better understanding of why importers abide by the agreement and allocate resources in safety control.

Online publication date: Sun, 18-Mar-2007

The full text of this article is only available to individual subscribers or to users at subscribing institutions.

 
Existing subscribers:
Go to Inderscience Online Journals to access the Full Text of this article.

Pay per view:
If you are not a subscriber and you just want to read the full contents of this article, buy online access here.

Complimentary Subscribers, Editors or Members of the Editorial Board of the International Journal of Agricultural Resources, Governance and Ecology (IJARGE):
Login with your Inderscience username and password:

Username:        Password:          Forgotten your password?

Want to subscribe?
A subscription gives you complete access to all articles in the current issue, as well as to all articles in the previous three years (where applicable). See our Orders page to subscribe.

If you still need assistance, please email subs@inderscience.com