The Pandemic Rewired Food Safety Perceptions — Not Always Correctly

The study: Djekic I et al. 2021. “Covid-19 pandemic effects on food safety — Multi-country survey study.” Food Control 122:107800. DOI 10.1016/j.foodcont.2020.107800. A survey of 825 food companies across 16 countries during the first months of the pandemic, examining how food safety systems responded — what companies prioritized, what they lacked, and which links of the supply chain felt the strain.

COVID-19 isn’t foodborne — the evidence was clear early — but the pandemic still stress-tested every food safety system on the planet. While consumer surveys captured the grocery-wiping and takeout fears, Djekic’s team surveyed the other side of the counter: the companies themselves. The result is a rare multi-country snapshot of an industry improvising under pressure — and a case study in which preparations actually mattered when the crisis arrived.

What 825 companies reported

The maturity of a company’s existing food safety system turned out to be the main predictor of how well it responded — the strongest systems adapted fastest, which is an argument for building resilience before you need it. Staff awareness and hygiene were rated the two most important attributes in combating COVID-19 within food operations; temperature-checking of workers and WHO health protocols, by contrast, were judged to have limited salience. Companies tightened hygiene procedures and bought more personal protective equipment, and every company surveyed declared that food safety had not been compromised at any point — a claim worth noting alongside the study’s limitation that it measured reported practice, not audited reality.

Retailers were identified as the supply chain link most affected by the pandemic; food storage facilities were the least. And the preparedness gap was stark: fewer than half of the companies had any documented emergency plans for pandemics or health issues in place. Before SARS-CoV-2, pandemics were simply not on most food companies’ threat lists — emergency planning covered water contamination and ingredient contamination, but not the scenario where the workforce itself is the vulnerability.

Lessons for risk communication — and for the next crisis

The pandemic demonstrated both the power and limits of public health messaging: clear, repeated, evidence-based communication eventually lands, but fear fills the vacuum first. Consumers conflated hazards readily — a respiratory virus became a reason to wipe down cereal boxes — and the correction took months. For food safety professionals, the lasting value is in the behaviors that improved (hand hygiene consciousness, the one genuinely beneficial residue) and the reminder that the public’s mental model of “germs” does not distinguish transmission routes.

The industry-side lesson is about preparedness. The companies that weathered the pandemic best were the ones whose food safety culture was already mature — hygiene discipline, trained staff, management commitment — because those are the same muscles a pandemic demands. Emergency plans need a pandemic chapter now: worker health screening, absenteeism contingencies, supply chain disruption, and communication protocols for the next novel threat. Fewer than half had one in 2020; there is no excuse for that fraction today.

The structural change with lasting food safety implications is the delivery surge. A larger share of meals now travels — in cars, on bikes, sitting on porches — extending the time-temperature abuse window for millions of servings daily. The industry adapted packaging and logistics under pressure, but the last-mile temperature control problem the pandemic amplified hasn’t been solved; it’s been normalized. That’s a risk management gap hiding in plain sight, and the perception surveys — consumer and industry alike — point at it.

Source: Djekic I et al. 2021. Covid-19 pandemic effects on food safety — Multi-country survey study. Food Control 122:107800.