The emergence of food safety issues is often related to food production, processing, circulation, and consumption, and the main reasons can be summarized into the following six categories:
Pollution causesFood is contaminated with external toxic and harmful substances (such as microorganisms and chemical pollutants) during processing, storage, or transportation.
Corruption and deteriorationDuring storage and transportation, food may spoil and deteriorate due to improper environmental conditions (such as uncontrolled temperature and humidity), resulting in the production of toxic substances.
Residual exceeding the standardExcessive use of pesticides during the growth stage of food, or food additives exceeding the range during processing, resulting in excessive residues.
Illegal additionIllegally adding substances that should not be added (such as non edible substances, inferior substitute ingredients).
Accidental ingestion and misuseDue to cognitive bias or operational errors, ingestion or misuse of toxic and harmful substances (such as using industrial salt as edible salt).
Intentional human behaviorIntentional actions such as poisoning involve adding toxic substances to food.
It should be noted that in actual investigation, specific links (such as production, circulation, and consumption) should be combined to identify the causes and develop targeted prevention and control measures.