Dar seafood ppp standard

7.3 Option 2 – A Primary Production and Processing Standard targeting high-risk seafood activities only

7.3.1 Benefits of Option 2

7.3.1.1 Consumers and the community

Consumers and the community will benefit from the greater assurance of the safety of the high risk seafood products: oysters and other bivalve molluscs. Outbreaks of food-borne illness have arisen from these high risk products in the past and imposed costs on consumers in the form of personal distress, incidents of death, costs of medical treatment, and time off work (patients and carers) which also implies some forgone household income. Under Option 2 the risk of future outbreaks will be minimised and hence the costs to consumers will be substantially reduced.

The benefits to the community of introducing food safety programs into the high risk bivalve mollusc industry were calculated by the National Risk Validation Project at $26.4 million per year³⁹. These benefits mainly accrue from a nationally consistent approach to managing bivalve safety, through a system that doesn’t permit opt-out by any State or Territory, and which enables food safety portfolios in all jurisdictions to audit the system.