Abstract: Objective To sort out problems for food safety in China systematically and to identify the number of the problems and their interactive relationships,and to construct a problem system for food safety in China.Methods Literatures related to food safety in China published in core journals between 2003 and 2012 were searched through China National Knowledge Infrastructure (CNKI) and of the 1 170 papers identified,790 were included in the study.The statements on problems for food safety in the literatures were extracted and summarized to compile a problem list and then a problem system was constructed based on the macro model of health system.Results Totally 34 problems for food safety in China were identified.In the problem system constructed,8 problems are about food supply process,17 about structure sheaf,5 about outcome sheaf,and 4 about exterior macroscopic environment.Conclusion Comprehensive and systemic understanding of problems for food safety in China and logical relationships among the problems is beneficial for the management of food safety problems.