Approaches Used in Organic and LowInput Food Processing: Impact on Food Quality and Safety, Results of a delphi survey from an expert consultation in 13 European countries

Summary

The overall objective of the subproject on processing, where the Delphi expert survey was an important task, is “to develop of a framework for the design of “minimum” and “low input” processing strategies, which guarantee food quality and safety.” It should support the overall aim of the integrated QLIF Project (Quality of Low-Input Food) in improving quality, ensuring safety and reducing costs along the European organic and “low input” food supply chains through research, dissemination and training activities.
The method chosen was the Delphi method. The work was carried out in the form of a two step Delphi survey. In the first round 250 experts in 13 countries in Europe were involved, and were asked to respond to a standardised questionnaire in October and November 2004 and the sec-ond round from March to May 2005. The Delphi expert survey was designed in such a way that the most important and currently discussed aspects regarding organic food processing have been taken up.
120 experts from 13 countries (Austria, Belgium, Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Great Brit-ain, Italy, Netherlands, Slovakia, Spain, and Switzerland) answered the first round and 83 experts from 13 countries answered the second round. Based on the experiences from other EU projects (Hamm et al. 2002), a classification was made with regard to the development stage of the country in the organic market development.