Food safety in the perspective of human rights and food crimes in the turkish criminal code no. 5237 (ART. 185-186)

Food is an indisputable necessity for the sustainability of life. However, the function of food depends on certain conditions. The first of these conditions is food safety. Unsafe food does not just serve malnutrition but also it leads to deterioration of human health and invites many vital, economic and social problems. Although the food safety violations, that have ravaged the food industry in the past years have enabled people, producers, suppliers and the state to take concrete steps in this regard, it is not a general trend to consider food safety as a human rights issue at this point. The study aims to explain why it is necessary to see food safety through the lens of human rights and what human rights it relates to. In the first part of the study, it deals with the meaning of food safety, with its historical background and legal ground, by referring to concepts such as food, right to food and public health. Food safety, as a need as old as nutrition itself, intersects with many human rights. When it comes to food safety, the fact that the dominant attitude is caught between protecting consumer rights or regulating the competitive environment in the food sector creates complacency in terms of prevention, detection, intervention and struggle when the consequences of violations in the field are considered. Therefore, it has become a necessity to evaluate food safety from a holistic perspective in terms of a future befitting public health and human dignity in general, and the human rights of individuals in particular. Because the indifference of sectoral practices and the ineffectiveness of legal regulations and sanctions pose serious dangers from micro to macro. In the second part of the study, the crime of "Adding Toxic Substance" and the crime of "Trade of Corrupted or Modified Food or Medicines" regulated in Articles 185 and 186 of the Turkish Penal Code No. 5237, which are referred to as "food crimes" in the literature, are reviewed. It is considered that these types of crimes are the most important and effective defense mechanisms in combating food safety violations in terms of Turkish Criminal Law, and that criminal law is a branch of law that aims not only to ensure social order, but also to take the society forward. For this reason, the awareness of "food safety as a human rights requirement" built in the first part of the study is aimed to be the main motivation for the examination and implementation of these articles.