한국 식품산업의 규제특성에 관한 연구|RISS 상세보기

다국어 초록 (Multilingual Abstract)

This study examines current status of regulations in food industry and the characteristics of them to show how regulations in Korean food industry have been carried out in 2010s (20102016) and to answer that major regulations that need improvement demonstrate which political circumstances among Wilson's theory of regulation.
This study reviews questions raised from post-legislation nationwide discussion by Ministry of Food and Drug Safety and interviews of professionals in food industry to look into problems of comparative label of sodium content, a new regulation that will take effect in 2017, and the stances of consumers. The conclusions drawn from this study are as following.
First, it is argued to raise the standard of regulations and relieve the intensity of regulations by promoting on reviews of regulations related to food industry in 2010s, regulations are mainly about standards of nutrition information and food safety. Providing nutrition information is controlled by various regulations such as color-coded nutrition labels, genetically modified food labels, children’s food preferences, and nutrition emphasis of food and live-stock products.
Regarding regulations on food safety, food industry asks for either improvement or abolition. Regulations in discussion include mandatory report of unsanitary substances, various standard criteria, mandatory self- quality check. According to Wilson’s theory, regulations related to food safety result in rising costs and restricted production for some food manufacturers because they should abide by regulations on nutrition information and report, by law, outcomes of self-quality check. On the other hand, regulations benefit majority of consumers with safe food assured by government. In conclusion, the pattern of regulations in food industry falls under entrepreneur politics in that costs for food enterprises are narrowly concentrated while public interest of food safety is widely distributed.
Regulations in food industry are also likely to be tight because they retain a social cause of enforcing safety for consumers. However, regulations naturally are double-sided, and unreasonable regulations for enterprises to abide by could be made. Therefore, unreasonable regulations that emphasize a cause of safety only are the social evil which blocks employment and investment or hinders the growth of industry.
Unfortunately, the reviews of regulations in food industry indicate that legislators like congress and government tend to sway with little consistency: they first carry out regulations based on entrepreneur politics then abolish or easy regulations as a response to voices of food companies or related associations or as a showcase of easy-regulation policies.
It is a characteristic of food-safety regulations that strong regulations are imposed in food industry. Such regulations have become tighter and more complex on manufacturing processes, products, and sales as well as raw ingredients and production facilities.
It is observed that regulations on food mostly are at first inclined to entrepreneur politics that congress and government impose costs on selected group of people for the sake of the safety of majority of people but, being faced with complaints from food industry about excessive burden, easy regulations again through related laws and decrees. Therefore, government and congress should set reasonable regulations through active communication with interested parties prior to legislations. Agencies responsible for regulations and congress should be strict on the quality of regulations in the beginning to prevent a vicious spiral of making regulations and easing them.
Meanwhile, as the society progresses, a theory of self-regulation that trusts the power of voluntary determination in the market is on the rise. Self-regulation is to decrease government intervention though administrative regulations and to increase voluntary authority of market. It aims to ease regulations in the end. In other words, its ultimate purpose is for food industry itself to grow awareness of food safety and manage industry through a voluntary-regulation system instead of forced regulations.
Second, there should be measures to raise the stability of Food Sanitation Act to prevent situations in which the regulated are hard to keep up with too often changing laws and decrees. Food Sanitation Act, a major regulation on food industry, has been revised 59 times, at the end of November, 2016, since its legislation in 1962. Food Sanitation Decree and Food Sanitary Regulations, another major regulations, have gone through 86 and 105 revisions each.
Especially, Food Sanitation Law has been revised 18 times in 1990s, and 24 times in 2000s. It went into 6 revisions in 2013, at the ratio of once in 2 months. Food Sanitary Regulation was revised 8 times in 2014, which raises questions on the stability of related laws. Government and congress, for the sake of legal stability, should avoid impulsive legislation and make a through examination prior to revising Food Sanitary Law.
Government makes an annual evaluation of the improvement of regulations. Among 37 government agencies and departments, Ministry of Food and Drug Safety was ranked on top in tightening regulations with 97 cases. In 2016, President Park Gun-Hye’s government actively pushes forward policies that improve or abolish ineffective regulations that overburdens enterprises or damages the market. Yet, congress and government attempt to tightening regulations each time accidents break out.
The ultimate purpose of industry regulations for food safety is to provide people with safe food. Congress and policy-makers as well as consumers call for tighter regulations each time big issues related to food safety are in the center of public attention. Unreasonably excessive regulations cannot be justified in the name of food safety for people.
Third, comparative label of sodium content, scheduled to go effect in May, 2017, should be thrown away or revised because the regulation, an outcome of poor examinations of drawbacks, leaves questions on its effectiveness and has obscure standards of legislation.
After looking into the backgrounds of adoption and legislation of comparative label of sodium content, it is observed that, Cost-benefit Analysis of Sodium Intake Reduction Policy in Korea, a study that justifies the adoption of comparative label of sodium content, and also Korea’s first study on cost- benefit related to sodium intake, is a pile of speculations.
It is hard to blindly accept that benefit estimation of a policy for less sodium intake is about 10 billion 614 million and 995 thousand dollars in a year even though the estimation has often been quoted with absolute authority. Moreover, researchers who have conducted a sodium cost estimation study are mainly composed of sodium policy-makers or belong to institutions run by tax payers’ money. Such backgrounds indicate that researchers may have aimed to use the study as a basis for government’s campaign for decreasing sodium intake. Thus, it is advisable for another research team to conduct a study on social cost related to sodium intake in order to raise credibility of cost-benefit estimation.
Looking into the legislative process of comparative label of sodium content, it is noted that congress, after color-coded label of sodium faced strong opposition of food professionals and experts, came up with an alternative in a hurry and passed it with little discussion. So comparative label of sodium content is an example of a rough-and- ready legislation that has neglected reviews of drawbacks as well as public debates with interested parties in food industry, those who are actually affected by the regulation in the field.
In order to carry out effective policies for food safety, it is recommended to gather various public opinion widely from scholars, media, and consumers as well as interested parties, and to reflect the collected voices to policies, which, to the ultimate, should lead to seeking measures for development of nation though sellers’ self-regulations and minimum regulations. Because it is natural that laws to maintain social order and people’s safety increase as the society gets more complex, but it is challenging to accomplish the object of providing safe food only with almighty-law belief that all food safety issues can be solved by law.

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