What Is an Effective Food Safety Culture & What Are the Obstacles to Its Development?

GFSR Interviews Walmart’s Vice President of Food Safety, Frank Yiannas

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GFSR is pleased to have had a recent opportunity to interview renowned food safety expert Frank Yiannas, who, as many of us know, is currently serving as Vice President of Food Safety at Walmart. Walmart serves more than 200 million customers around the world every week, making it the world’s largest food retailer.

Frank has earned many awards during his career and he has served the cause of food safety as a Past President of the International Association for Food Protection (IAFP) and a Past Vice-Chair of the Global Food Safety Initiative (GFSI). Frank is an adjunct Professor in the Food Safety Program at Michigan State University and he is the author of the books, Food Safety Culture, Creating a Behavior-based Food Safety Management System, and Food Safety = Behavior, 30 Proven Techniques to Enhance Employee Compliance.

Here is a transcript of Part One of the interview GFSR’s Managing Editor, Susan Crossman, conducted with Frank.

Food safety culture is not just a slogan or a communication campaign

GFSR: Frank, thank you for joining us today.

Yiannas:  My pleasure, thank you.

GFSR: The theme of today’s interview is: What Is an Effective Food Safety Culture & What Are the Obstacles to Its Development? I’d like to begin, Frank, by asking you what you feel the characteristics of an effective food safety culture are, and, even more basically, why a food safety culture is so important?