The role of GLOBAL G.A.P.: In improving competitiveness of agro-food industry

Abstract

The issues of food safety, standards and food quality represent a challenge for every food company which has to cope with in order to survive. The change in consumers attitudes has considerably been influenced by certain incidents related to food safety which clearly showed that more attention should be paid to food safety. Different actors should work together on this issue, from food producers (primary and final), consumer associations, international organizations, big retailers to the state. The purpose of this paper is to analyze the current situation in implementation of certification schemes for agro-food industry in which GLOBAL G.A.P. has been recognized as a perspective one. A special attention is paid to two directions: (1) Comparison of implementing GLOBAL G.A.P. standard and other Certification schemes and (2) Overview and opportunities for Serbia and neighboring countries, in relation to its EU food law and food safety certification schemes harmonization efforts.

Full text

583
Original scientic paper
EP 2015 (62) 3 (583-597)
Economics of Agriculture 3/2015
UDC: 631.57:339.137.2
THE ROLE OF GLOBAL G.A.P. IN IMPROVING COMPETITIVENESS OF AGRO-FOOD INDUSTRY
THE ROLE OF GLOBAL G.A.P. IN IMPROVING
COMPETITIVENESS OF AGRO-FOOD INDUSTRY
Cariša Bešić1, Srđan Bogetić2, Dragan Ćoćkalo3, Dejan Đorđević4
Summary
The issues of food safety, standards and food quality represent a challenge for every food
company which has to cope with in order to survive. The change in consumers attitudes
has considerably been inuenced by certain incidents related to food safety which clearly
showed that more attention should be paid to food safety. Different actors should work
together on this issue, from food producers (primary and nal), consumer associations,
international organizations, big retailers to the state. The purpose of this paper is to
analyze the current situation in implementation of certication schemes for agro-food
industry in which GLOBAL G.A.P. has been recognized as a perspective one. A special
attention is paid to two directions: (1) Comparison of implementing GLOBAL G.A.P.
standard and other Certication schemes and (2) Overview and opportunities for Serbia
and neighboring countries, in relation to its EU food law and food safety certication
schemes harmonization efforts.
Keywords: agro-food industry, certication schemes, GLOBAL G.A.P.,
competitiveness, Serbia.
JEL: D24, Q13, Q18.
Introduction
In recent years in developed countries a trend related to production of healthy food has
1 Cariša Bešić, Ph.D., Associate Professor, University of Kragujevac, Faculty of technical
science Čačak, 32000 Čačak, Svetog Save Street no. 65, Republic of Serbia. Phone: +381
60 369 96 96, E-mail: carisa.besic@sbb.rs.
2 Srđan Bogetić, Ph.D., Professor, Belgrade Business School, 11000 Belgrade, Kraljice Marije
Street no. 73, Republic of Serbia. Phone: +381 64 125 42 92, E-mail: sbogetic@yahoo.com.
3 Dragan Ćoćkalo, Ph.D., Associate Professor, University of Novi Sad, Technical faculty
“Mihajlo Pupin” in Zrenjanin, 23000 Zrenjanin, Đure Đakovića Street nn., Republic of
Serbia. Phone: +381 62 801 97 41, E-mail: cole@tfzr.uns.ac.rs.
4 Dejan Đorđević, Ph.D., Full Professor, University of Novi Sad, Technical faculty “Mihajlo
Pupin” in Zrenjanin, 23000 Zrenjanin, Đure Đakovića Street nn., Republic of Serbia. Phone:
+381 62 801 97 26, E-mail: djole@rocketmail.com.

584 EP 2015 (62) 3 (583-597)
Cariša Bešić, Srđan Bogetić, Dragan Ćoćkalo, Dejan Đorđević
been developed. European Union (EU) pays a great attention to safe food which can be
illustrated by EU Council and Parliament Directions. In Introduction part it is written
that (Varga et al., 2006) free ux of safe and healthy food is a crucial element of interior
market (EU) which signicantly contributes to health and welfare of the citizens as
well as to social and economic interests.
Food production, distribution and consumption have a signicant inuence on the
environment (e.g. great energy and material demand, emission of CO2, increased
needs for agricultural areas), but they also have a serious social, economic and
medical consequences (e.g. health risks, increased obesity, hunger). From the aspect
of sustainability, there have been many changes in behavior of people in developed
countries which results in increased energy consumption, agricultural areas and other
resources. Therefore, the trend is being developed in those countries in relation to
food consumption which can be observed through two elements: its inuence on the
environment and health.
However, beside consumers, food industry as well has begun changing its relationship
towards food production. The reasons for such relations can be found in the following trends:
- Changes on food markets which are more and more oriented towards safe and
healthy food;
- Greater role of primary food production in the process of safe food production;
- Increased care of the society related to environmental protection through reduction
of pollution, energy efciency increase and usage of alternative energy sources;
- Technological changes in food production which enable better food processing, as
well as more secure and safer delivery through logistic chain;
- New legal regulations demanding production of safe and healthy food without
using chemical supplements;
- Enlarging wholesale chains which results in increased competitiveness.
In Rural Development Programme from 2014 to 2020 European Union obliged all
countries members to nance directly farmers with 30% of incestive funds which
would be invested in implementation of sustainable agricultural methods (ecologically
acceptable). It means that if you deal with environmentally friendly farming you will
not have to change the way of work in order to adjust your methods to environmentally
friendly ones. There is also a new support programme for the current farmers who
want to move on to ecological farming (within Common Agricultural Policy - CAP).
All countries members can offer incentives to environmentally friendly farmers via
various types of exible nancial options which will support, for example, cooperation
in food production chain for the sake of supporting innovations, development of plans
related to quality of agricultural products, making groups or producers’organizations,
etc. (Parađiković, 2015).

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Methodology and purpose
Implementation of standards in Agro-food industry is becoming a pre-condition
for improved business. The importance of implementing standards in agriculture is
increased because they give a feeling of certainty to consumers – they are sure that the
food they buy is safe and healthy. Investments in standard implementation, training
of employees and creation of business chain which will take care of production in
food industry are becoming an important pre-condition for increasing the level of
competitive advantage on the global market.
Certication schemes globally are gaining more and more importance. The most
prevalent schemes in Serbia and neighboring countries are: ISO 9001, ISO 14001,
GLOBAL G.A.P., ISO 22000, BRC Global Standard, Demeter, and PDO/PGI/TSG
systems. The GLOBAL G.A.P. has been recognized as a perspective one in this region.
With this trend in mind and to compensate for the lack of research in this area, this
paper presents an overview of certication schemes in the European agriculture and
food industry, especially in Serbia and neighboring countries. In addition, the paper
highlights the characteristics of these schemes and concludes with the convergence
trends that can be observed throughout the European Union and beyond.
Main characteristics of GLOBAL G.A.P. standard implementation
There are numerous private food standards and regulations which differ from one another
according to the extent of complacency: some of them are voluntary while the others
are compulsory. Another difference is in terms of their geographic area.There are also
individual standards such as Nature’s Choice (Tesco), Filières Qualité, Field-to-Fork
and collective national and international standards, Assured Food Standards, Qualitat
Sicherheit and Farm Assured British Beef and Lamb as the examples for former and
International Food Standard, Marine Stewardship Council, Forest Stewardship Council
and GLOBALG.A. pas the examples of the latter.
A variety of quality assurance systems have been adopted to manage particular product
attributes. While each rm is unique, industries have established, over time, a similar
pattern of quality assurance systems adoption and implementation - several different
quality assurance systems are adopted and pieced together to obtain a satisfactory level
of control for each of desirable attributes of the product. (Gawron, Theuvsen, 2009.)
The BRC Global Standard, which includes quality management system audits in food
processing companies, grew out of the initiative of The British Retail Consortium - the
leading trading organization in the UK. It is an international scheme with about 14.469
certicates issued in Europe and about 7.500 in the rest of the world.
Protected Designation of Origin (PDO), Protected Geographical Indication (PGI) and
Traditional Specialities Guaranteed (TSG) systems started in 1992. with the support
of the European Union. The main objective was to differentiate food products by
guaranteeing their region-of-origin or traditional production methods. Consumers are

586 EP 2015 (62) 3 (583-597)
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informed by product labels - the focus here is on product quality. All in all (published,
registered and applied), there are 1,437 PDOs, PGIs and TSGs in the European Union.
(EU, 2015.)
Demeter standard, one of the rst standards which started dealing with organic food,is
becoming more and more important in the countries in this region, in which Slovenia
and Croatia have a signicant number of certied operations. Demeter has about 9,900
members in total.
ISO organization adopted the standard ISO 22000 in 2005. This standard can be
implemented independently from other standardized ISO management systems.
ISO 22000 integrates the principles of the Hazard Analysis and Critical Control
Point (HACCP) system and application steps developed by the Codex Alimentarius
Commission. By means of auditable requirements, it combines the HACCP plan
with prerequisite programmes. Hazard analysis is the key to an effective food safety
management system, since conducting a hazard analysis assists in organizing the
knowledge required to establish an effective combination of control measures, (Surak,
2007). Complementarity with HACCP is one out of ten reasons for implementation
of ISO 22000, while the other reasons are the following (Escanciano, Santos-Vijande,
2014): improve product quality and safety, improve the rm’s image in the market
and consumers’ condence, strengthen the rm’s future competitive advantage,
and improve internal processes and procedures and their monitoring. ISO 22000 is
an industrial-specic risk management system for any type of food processing and
marketing, which can be closely incorporated with the quality management system
of ISO 9001. Combined with ISO 14001, this standard represents an equal partner in
creation of integrated management system based on a risk. Although the “youngest“
among a series of private standards related to food chain there is the biggest rate of
growth in implementation of ISO 22000 - according to the data from 2013, this standard
is implemented in 142 countries worldwide, with totally 26,847 certicate.
Positioning of GLOBAL G.A.P. in relation to some quality assurance systems is
illustrated in the Table 1. 3rd party certifcation (TPC) has emerged as a signifcant
regulatory mechanism in the global agro-food system - TPC reects the growing power
of supermarkets to regulate the global agro-food system (Hatanaka et al., 2005).
GLOBAL G.A.P. nowadays represents one of the most common certied schemes
worldwide in the eld of food industry. Initially started as EUREPG.A.P. it was
turned into GLOBAL G.A.P. in 2007 as more and more producers and retailers around
the globe got connected over time. Primarily a pre-farm-gate process standard, for
worldwide food safety affairs GLOBAL G.A.P. has increasingly been considered as a
main reference for Good Agricultural Practice (G.A.P.). In countries including Austria,
Chile, Denmark, France, Germany, Japan, Kenya, Mexico, New Zealand, Spain, and the
UK, the GLOBAL G.A.P. has been incorporated into their domestic G.A.P. standards,
usually in the form of public-private joint ventures (Mitchell, 2008).
In a wider context Good Agricultural Practices (G.A.P.) “applies available knowledge

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to addressing environmental, economic and social sustainability for on-farm production
and post-production processes resulting in safe and healthy food and non-food
agricultural products” (FAO, 2003). Good agricultural practice assumes implementation
of knowledge in using natural resources on sustainable principles, in a human way and
along with securing economic efciency and social stability in order to produce safe,
healthy food and other agricultural products. Generic indicators and practices of G.A.P.
include aspects related to (FAO, 2003): “soil and water management, crop and fodder
production, crop protection, animal production and health, harvesting and on-farm
processing and storage, on-farm energy and waste management, human welfare, health
and safety, and wildlife and landscape”. One of the greatest benets which G.A.P.
brings is that at practical level it helps in standardization of agricultural production and
improvement of agricultural products’competitiveness on the global market.
Table 1. Comparison of quality assurance systems
Quality
Assurance
System
Attribute
managed Implementation Advantages Disadvantages
ISO 9001 Quality Non-mandatory
Good fondation for a
quality management
system
Guarantee system quality
only (not output quality).
Experiance to implement.
To generic.
ISO 14001 Environment Non-mandatory
Good fondation for a
environment
management system
Does not guarantee a
certain level of benets.
Does not specify particular
production practices.
ISO 22000 Food safety
Mandatory
minimum for all
suppliers
Good foundation for
food safety management
system.
Based on HACCP
Dicult to implement.
Comprehension of the
system.
Experiance to implement.
GLOBAL
G.A.P.
Environment
Food safety
Social
Mandatory
minimum for all
suppliers
Objectivity (3rd party
audits).
Reduces monitoring
and auditing costs.
Species production
practices.
Not exible.
High investment and
running costs.
BRC
Food safety
Value
Organoleptic
Mandatory
minimum for all
suppliers
Reduces auditing costs
Objectivity (3rd party
audits)
Includes food safety
component (HACCP)
Not as exible as form-
specic quality assurance
system.
Source: Sterns et al., 2001; Bilalis et al., 2009; Cooper, Graffham, 2012.
Thanks to good results in practice in EU, EUREPG.A.P. has spread worldwide so
it was named GLOBAL G.A.P. The certicate GLOBAL G.A.P. assumes except
HACCP criteria, ecology standards as well for the elds on which food is produced.
There is a similarity between HACCP and GLOBAL G.A.P.,which is related to the
existance of the so called control points within the production process in which

588 EP 2015 (62) 3 (583-597)
Cariša Bešić, Srđan Bogetić, Dragan Ćoćkalo, Dejan Đorđević
certain requirements should be satised in order to secure a quality production and a
product harmonized to standards.
The principles of GLOBAL G.A.P. are (Qualitass Education, 2009):
- Limited and controlled usage of all types of agro-chemical substances.
- Hygienic treatment during production and manipulation of agricultural products.
- Providing instructions and recording all activities along with securing traceability.
- Original rules that enable objective verication (conrmation of the procedure).
- Mutual communication and exchange of opinions among producers, sale persons
and users.
- Care for the environment and sustainable development.
- Responsible conduct towards employees on the farm.
- Care for farm animal welfare.
The Certicate GLOBAL G.A.P. assumes, except HACCP criteria, ecology standards as
well for the elds on which the food is produced. Three market trends have conditioned
an initiative for adoption of this standard: increasing complexity of retailer supply
chains, increasing the inuence of business surroundings and general complexity and
enlargement of market requirements, in other words, consumers (Đorđević et al., 2011).
Consciousness related to safety and quality of food is signicantly increasing on consumer
goods markets. In order to satisfy their requirements, consumers are demanding from
retailers, especially in developed countries, implementation and respect of strict rules,
standardized procedures and activities as well as certain characteristics of products.
Consumers’ pressure and the external image are two of the main driving forces to
certication (Darnall, Edwards, 2006).
The main requirements of the nal users are (Qualitass Education, 2009):
- Healthy, quality and biologically valuable food,
- Producers’ responsibility towards environmental protection,
- Human relations towards employees on the farm and
- Care for animal welfare.
The result of retailers initiative is that GLOBAL G.A.P. is being spread very fast
worldwide. Firms seek certication when their partners lack credible information
(Masood, 2013). In this way, through a GLOBAL G.A.P. certication scheme, retailer
convey quality signal to consumers. On the other hand sides of supply chain, growers
participate in the certication process in order to earn market access to export market.
The magnitude of GLOBAL G.A.P. standard can be expressed by three indicators
(Masood, 2013): (a) number of GLOBAL G.A.P. certicates issued; (b) number of

589EP 2015 (62) 3 (583-597)
THE ROLE OF GLOBAL G.A.P. IN IMPROVING COMPETITIVENESS OF AGRO-FOOD INDUSTRY
producers accepted under GLOBAL G.A.P. certication process; (c) number of hectares
harvested under GLOBAL G.A.P. certication.
GLOBAL G.A.P. was spreading very fast from 2005 when about 35000 rms were
included in certication process until 2012 with almost four times more rms, and
nally in 2015 when over 140000 rms are being certied (Figure 1). GLOBAL
G.A.P. scheme has a network of 1.400 trained inspectors and audits who work for 142
accredited certied bodies whose aim is to certify 409 agricultural products in 112
countries, (GLOBAL G.A.P., 2015a). The countries, such as Chile, Italy, Kenia, Peru,
South Africa, are much more covered by this standardization scheme.
Continental share of the certificate is almost unchanged, which can be seen in the
Figure 2. However, new markets are more significant for the analysis, for example,
Russia with its mushrooms, Greece with sea bass and bream, Netherlands with
pork production.
Figure 1. Share of certied producers
Source: GLOBAL G.A.P., 2015a.

590 EP 2015 (62) 3 (583-597)
Cariša Bešić, Srđan Bogetić, Dragan Ćoćkalo, Dejan Đorđević
Figure2. Share of certied producers (in %)
Source: GLOBAL G.A.P., 2015a.
If we look at the list of the rst ve countries according to the number of certied
producers we’ll see that these countries are, among the others, well-known for
food production. It’s no surprise that these countries initiated the implementation
of GLOBAL G.A.P. in order to improve their competitiveness. An interesting
fact is that these ve countries have been on the top of the list for several years.
Figure 3 shows a comparison of the leading countries related to GLOBAL G.A.P.
certicates for two years successively – a signicant number of certied companies
in Netherlands is obvious.
Figure 3. First ve countries according to the number of certied producers
Source: GLOBAL G.A.P., 2015a.

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The acquisition of GLOBAL G.A.P. certicate assumes an obligation on the
side of producers to initiate the process of registration and certication every
year. There are the following four, different options of certication (Qualitass
Education, 2009; GLOBAL G.A.P., 2015b):
- option 1, certication of an individual producer or a company,
- option 2, certication of a group of producers,
- option 3, parallel certication of individual producers (Benchmarking),
- option 4, parallel certication of a group of producers (Benchmarking).
Benchmarking certication is performed on an exclusive request of clients who, in that
way, want to control their own equivalence via the analysis of contents and parameters
in relation to GLOBAL G.A.P.
Before explaining the option 2 related to certication of a group of producers it is
necessary to explain the notion of a group of producers. A group of producers represents
a registered group whose aim is application for certicate acquisition. (GLOBAL
G.A.P., 2015b).
A group of producers is a legally legitimate entity whose nal responsibility is
a production and a product. It can be registered as an association of producers,
cooperations, a trade company, a warehouse and packing company, a cooperation, etc.
In order to be certied under the option 2 a group of producers must have implemented
QMS. All registered group members are responsible for the production of their products
but they are not allowed to sell their products certied as GLOBAL G.A.P. beyond the
group (Qualitass Education, 2009; GLOBAL G.A.P., 2015b).
Implementation of agro-food industry standards in Serbia and neighboring
countries
The implementation of agricultural standards in Serbia still isn’t adequate to the potentials
of this eld. Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Water Management of the Republic
of Serbia by its Regulation on using incestive funds for introduction and certication
of safety system in the period from 2005 to 2008 (Serbian Government, 2005-2008)
inuenced the increase of certied companies. By organizing the promotional action
“Think in time” they wanted to raise consciousness on consumers’ rights to this kind
of protection and the importance of having a documented quality system, for food
consumers. In November, 2009 Governments of Switzerland and Serbia signed the
agreement on realization of the project “Aid in the eld of GLOBAL G.A.P. standard”.
According to the data of Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Water Management of
the Republic of Serbia, from 2005 until the end of 2008, there were 781 certied users.
In the same time, 112 of them suspended and terminated certication procedure. The
greatest number of certications but suspensions as well was in 2006 – 359 certications

592 EP 2015 (62) 3 (583-597)
Cariša Bešić, Srđan Bogetić, Dragan Ćoćkalo, Dejan Đorđević
and 61 suspensions (Infogo.biz, 2013). The number of certied companies is signicant
considering the fact that in 2004, 85% of the companies from this industry never heard
of HACCP. Connectivity of standards ISO 14001 and HACCP is highly signicant
for food companies. In other words, a company which implements the standard ISO
14001affects the protection of global environment (water, air, ground, natural resources,
ora and fauna, people and their relations) and development of environmental quality.
The standard ISO 14001has a signicant activity in environmental protection,
particularly in risk management. Risk management includes a decision – making in
relation to the way of environmental protection activity procedure which relies on
the result of risk estimation. The standard HACCP represents a management system
in which safety of food products is considered through the analysis and control of
biological, chemical and physical risks in complete production chain. That is the reason
why HACCP represents a logical continuation of ISO 14001 in companies business.
Table 2 presents a comparative example of standards implementation in agro-food
industry and their use in Serbia and neighboring countries. Regarding West Balkan
countries (WBC), Serbia is a leader in relation to implementation of all schemes of
standards. However, as regards to other neighboring countries Serbia lags behind
signicantly. Apart from GLOBAL G.A.P. implementation of other standards in
Serbia is low. Comparing to Hungary, for example, Serbia lags behind considerably
in implementation of GLOBAL G.A.P. scheme. This additionaly contributes to
uncompetitiveness of Serbian companies. It is obvious from the Table 4 that some
neighborin countries, such as Romania and Bulgaria, are more oriented towards ISO
certication schemes (generally) than towards GLOBAL G.A.P. scheme, while for
Serbia (strictly for food safety) the opposite is true.
There are several reasons for insufcient use of the standards in Serbian agro-food
industry and they can be found in the following fact – a company which implements
GLOBAL G.A.P. standard has an obligation to perform re-certication every year,
which represents a signicant nancial effort for the company. Moreover, Ministry of
Agriculture, Forestry and Water Management of the Republic of Serbia terminated co-
nancing during implementation process of international standards.
Table 2. Implementation of standards in Serbia and neighboring countries
ISO
9001
ISO
14001
ISO
22000
GLOBAL
G.A.P. BRC PDO/
PGI/TSG Demeter
Albania 167 34 7 0 1 0 0
Bosnia and
Hercegovina 794 141 17 269 2 0 0
Croatia 2,636 828 97 141 14 13 1
Macedonia 399 131 25 14 1 0 0
Montenegro 118 24 7 0 0 0 0
Serbia 2,366 762 193 281 37 0 0
Slovenia 1,993 468 19 22 9 25 27
WBC Total 8,473 2,388 365 727 64 38 28

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ISO
9001
ISO
14001
ISO
22000
GLOBAL
G.A.P. BRC PDO/
PGI/TSG Demeter
Bulgaria 5,378 1,373 244 17 29 7 2
Hungary 7,186 1,955 137 957 121 15 19
Romania 18,450 8,744 1,014 46 51 4 1
Source: ISO, 2014; BRC, 2015; EU, 2015; DI, 2015, GLOBAL G.A.P., 2012.
According to Đekić et al., (2011) and Smigić et al., (2015) in some Western Balkans
countries (Serbia, Bosnia and Herzegovina and Macedonia) implementation of
different quality and food safety assurance schemes is either required by law or large
multinationals (both producers and retailers) which establish their own schemes and
requirements (such as HACCP). However, other private and food quality standards are
applied periodically although their implementation and certication is promoted by
the governments of these countries. Except HACCP, food safety standard ISO 22000
and ISO 9001 are most commonly implemented in West Balkan countries. It should
be mentioned that food producers in these countries received nancial support from
different governmental and nongovernmental organizations (USAid, SIEPA and EU
funds). Besides HACCP, the most common certications in the Western Balkan food
industry cover food safety (ISO 22000) and quality management systems (ISO 9001).
Implementation of GLOBAL G.A.P. and other standards which are used by Serbian agro-
food producers implies a support of the Government which has to create a stimulative
ambience for procuders. The Government has already stimulated and supported the
implementation of HACCP which is nowadays compulsory but it is also necessary to
do the same with other standards in this eld. At this pont it should be emphasized that
food safety system in Serbia needs certain improvements related to food safety control,
inspection, knowledge and expertize. In other words, there is room for improving
professionals, such as inspectors, governmental ofcials, consultants and auditors. In
addition, a lot of work and efforts should be invested in improving transparency and
communication between legal authorities, consumers and food business operators,
(Smigić et al., 2015). Moreover, it is necessary to re-establish supporting mechanisms
to Serbian agro-food producers through the support in the following elds: nances,
education, applying practical experiences, information on other standards close to this
eld, information on new trends in agricultural industry, taking part in competitions
such as G.A.P. Awards.
Conclusion
The implementation of GLOBAL G.A.P in agro-food industry is of great importance
both for the company which has implemented it and for other factors on the market,
for example, consumers of its products, the environment in which it operates, business
partners who must have the same standards as a precondition for cooperation. This
is how a chain of good practice is made which motivates other companies to start
the implementation of GLOBAL G.A.P. in order to assure consumers in safety of
agricultural products which they buy in retail shops.

594 EP 2015 (62) 3 (583-597)
Cariša Bešić, Srđan Bogetić, Dragan Ćoćkalo, Dejan Đorđević
The role of retail shops is crucial in encouraging the implementation of GLOBAL G.A.P
and other standards familiar with this eld. The reason lies in the fact that retailers
are the rst who can notice consumers’ attitudes towards food. Today, consumers are
well-informed about healthy food as well as about new trends in this eld (e.g. less
fats, sugar, etc.), along with the support of international organizations (FAO) which
additionally inuences exibility of producers and retailer chains.
Unfortunately, food companies in Serbia are not sufciently supported by the state to
implement GLOBAL G.A.P. We have noticed only the examples of individual support
by international organizations (USAid, SIEPA, EU funds, SECO) and NGO sector so
far, which is not enough if we want to make a step forward in this eld.
Very implementation of GLOBAL G.A.P. has considerable advantages of which the
following are identied: easier access to consumers on international markets, higher
market price of products (perhaps, not in the beginning but in the future it is expected),
etc. However, whether GLOBAL G.A.P. will be implemented depends only on agro-
food producers and manufacturers, on their estimation and plans in relation to their
company in the future. In what extent and in what way will the pressure imposed by
markets, the leading commercial chains and the necessity of Serbia to turn towards
competitive export of agro-food products inuence Serbian agro-food industry? This
question will be answered by some future researches and analysis.
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597EP 2015 (62) 3 (583-597)
THE ROLE OF GLOBAL G.A.P. IN IMPROVING COMPETITIVENESS OF AGRO-FOOD INDUSTRY
ULOGA GLOBAL G.A.P.-A U UNAPREĐENJU KONKURENTNOSTI
POLJOPRIVREDNO-PREHRAMBENE INDUSTRIJE
Cariša Bešić5, Srđan Bogetić6, Dragan Ćoćkalo7, Dejan Đorđević8
Apstrakt
Pitanja bezbednosti hrane, standardizacije i kvaliteta hrane, predstavljaju izazove za
svako preduzeće u ovoj oblasti, na koje ono mora da odgovori ukoliko želi da opstane
na tržištu. Na promenu stavova potrošača, značajno su uticali određeni incidenti sa
bezbednošću hrane, koji su pokazali da se pitanju bezbednosti hrane mora posvetiti
posebna pažnja. U ovom lancu moraju zajedno biti uključeni različiti akteri, od
proizvođača hrane (primarni i nalni), udruženja potrošača, međunarodnih organizacija,
velikih maloprodajnih lanaca do države. Cilj ovog rada je da se analizira trenutna
situacija u primeni sertikacionih šema u poljoprivredno-prehrambenoj industriji, gde je
GLOBAL G.A.P. prepoznat kao perspektivan. Posebna pažnja je upućena u dva pravca:
(1) Komparacija primene GLOBAL G.A.P. standarda u odnosu na druge sertikacione
šeme i (2) Pregled i mogućnosti za Srbiju i susedne zemlje, u odnosu napore koji se ulažu
u harmonizaciju zakona i šema sertikacije sa onima koji su zastupljeni u EU.
Ključne reči: poljoprivredno-prehrambena industrija, sertikacione šeme, GLOBAL
G.A.P., konkurentnost, Srbija.
5 Vanredni profesor, dr Cariša Bešić, Univerzitet u Kragujevcu, Fakultet tehničkih nauka,
Čačak, 32000 Čačak, Svetog Save 65, Republika Srbija. Telefon: +381 60 369 96 96,
E-mail: carisa.besic@sbb.rs
6 Redovni profesor, dr Srđan Bogetić, Beogradska Poslovna Škola, 11000 Beograd, 73 Kraljice
Marije, Republika Srbija.Telefon: +381 64 125 42 92, E-mail: sbogetic@yahoo.com
7 Vanredni profesor, dr Dragan Ćoćkalo, Univerzitet u Novom Sadu, Tehnički fakultet
“Mihajlo Pupin” u Zrenjaninu, 23000 Zrenjanin, Đure Đakovića bb, Republika Srbija.
Telefon: +381 62 801 97 41, E-mail: cole@tfzr.uns.ac.rs
8 Redovni profesor, dr Dejan Đorđević, Univerzitet u Novom Sadu, Tehnički fakultet “Mihajlo
Pupin” u Zrenjaninu, 23000 Zrenjanin, Đure Đakovića bb, Republika Srbija. Telefon: +381
62 801 97 26, E-mail: djole@rocketmail.com