Abstract: Food crimes are mainly punished through two means: administrative law enforcement and criminal justice. The linkage between administrative and criminal evidence serves as a bridge for administrative and criminal penalties in food cases. The effectiveness of food safety governance is directly affected by whether or not the collection of evidence in administrative-criminal cases is standardized. However, there are three major obstacles to the administrative-criminal evidence linkage in the field of food safety in China. They are as follows: 1) insufficient legislative coordination, which affects the legal basis for the administrative-criminal evidence linkage; 2) weak evidentiary weight, which affects the practical operation of the administrative-criminal evidence linkage; and 3) flaws in evidence collection, evidence preservation, and review processes, which create obstacles for regulatory and criminal justice departments in specific implementation. To ensure the efficient and fair operation of the administrative-criminal evidence linkage mechanism in the field of food safety and to strengthen deterrence​ against food safety-related criminal and illegal acts, it is necessary to improve the foundational legislation governing the administrative-criminal evidence linkage, clarify the standards and mechanisms for evidence collection, and establish an enforcement supervision system.

Key words: administrative law enforcement evidence; evidence collection; execution coordination; food safety