Abstract: Reasonable allocation of public law responsibility is very important for restraining malfeasance and standardizing food safety supervision. China has established administrative and criminal responsibility systems for malfeasance in food supervision and management. The administrative responsibility is mainly divided into two parts: the responsibilities of the people’s governments at or above the county level and those of the constituent departments of those governments, and a responsibility system should be established to distinguish the severity of dereliction of duty. The criminal responsibility is mainly stipulated by the crime of malfeasance in food supervision and management. The revision of the crime of malfeasance in food supervision and management reflects China’s strategies for food safety governance. The allocation of public law liability for malfeasance in food supervision and management should conform to those strategies including taking regulatory responsibilities as the basis, taking due diligence as the core standard of responsibility, adhering to the basic principle of adapting punishment to responsibility, and establishing a foothold in the reality of food safety co-regulation. The Amendment (XI) to the Criminal Law finally maintains ‘causing serious consequences or any other serious circumstance’ as the typical conditions of incrimination, and appropriately adjusts the scope of criminalization. The amendment has significantly reduced the number of cases concerning malfeasance in food safety supervision and limited the scope of criminal penalties, but the amendment has expanded criminal penalties on a small amount of malfeasance.

Key words: food safety supervision; crime of malfeasance in food supervision and management; Amendment (XI) to the Criminal Law; administrative responsibility; criminal responsibility