Consumers want to ensure the safety of all food products they buy, especially agricultural products they consume directly. With this awareness, the need to establish a number of systems and standards has been inevitable in order to offer consumers the guarantee that both direct agricultural products and processed foods can be produced safely.
It has been due to the hard-to-repair damage to the ecological balance and the concern that future generations will not have the necessary air, soil, water and climatic conditions for agricultural production with global warming. On the one hand, the World Trade Organization and the World Food Organization, on the other hand, national and international organizations, and on the other hand, official authorities of the countries have started to work to do their part in this matter.
The World Trade Organization has reached an agreement on food safety practices in order to ensure the safety of international standards on Plant and Animal Health in the foreign trade of agricultural products. The first of the Convention on Health and Phytosanitary Measures is the Threat Assessment and Critical Analysis Points in food and the other is GAP, which means Good Agricultural Practices for the production in agricultural areas.
The World Food Organization (FAO) has also conducted research on the principles of Good Agricultural Practices (GAP). Finally, large-scale retailers in the European Union countries came together to form the European Retailers Product Research Group (EUREP) and in the year 1999 established the EUREPGAP (European Retailers Product Working Group Good Agricultural Practices) Protocol, which is relevant to the principles of good agricultural activities in vegetables and fruits. .
The principles of Good Agricultural Practice have emerged as a result of these efforts. When determining the principles of Good Agricultural Practices, first of all, the idea of not harming the health of the people living on the earth and all other living beings was fundamental. This was followed by environmental conditions. Not damaging the nature during agricultural production is another principle of Good Agricultural Practices. Another principle is to monitor, control and keep agricultural activities sustainable. Everything depends on safe and healthy agricultural production.
For the principles of Good Agricultural Practice, it can be said that it is a form of agricultural production under control and supervision. Producers according to the principles of this system will benefit from this in many ways. Since the eligibility criteria prepared in accordance with Good Agricultural Practices principles will be applied and documented to the production methods and all processes of the producer companies, all activities will be under control and thanks to compliance with these standards, the hands of the producer companies will be stronger. Because the products will be reliable in terms of health, competitiveness will increase and will find customers more easily. This will also affect the profitability of the firm.
