Food Management Systems LEC

What is the role of veterinarians in food safety? (3)

• Primary production

  • Prevention and control of food safety hazards at the farm

• Slaughter, processing and distribution

  • Technical management and official controls

• International trade

  • Certification of compliance with animal health and food safety standards

Define “food safety” Vs. “food security”:

• Food safety: the guarantee that foods will not cause harm to the health of those who consume them, and it is a fundamental property of food quality

  • About quality

• Food security: the ability to obtain and/or to store basic food products to guarantee that food is available for consumption

  • About availability

Define “hazard” vs. “risk”:

• Hazard

  • a biological, chemical or physical agent in, or condition of, food or feed with the potential to cause an adverse health effect

• Risk

  • a function of the probability of an adverse health effect and the severity of that effect, consequential to a hazard

What are the 3 categories of hazards in food? Give examples for each

Biological

• Bacteria

• Viruses

• Parasites

Chemical

• Vet drug residues

• Pesticides

• Heavy metals

• SOMETIMES allergens

Physical

• Bones

• Wood

• Stones

For food safety approaches, what is better? Hazard-based assessments or risk-based assessments?

Risk based

Who promotes risk-based assessments for food safety?

• World Trade Organisation (WTO) 

• Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD)

• Codex Alimentarius Commission (FAO and WHO)

• European Union (EU)

Which regulation lays down the general principles and requirements of food law, covering all stages of food and feed production (“from farm to fork”)? How is this enforced?

EC 178/2002

• Established the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA)

  • Risk assessor

  • EFSA is responsible for independent scientific advice and support

• Created systems to manage food safety incidents, e.g.:

  • Rapid Alert System for Food and Feed (RASFF)

Which regulation lays down the general rules and principles for HYGIENE of foodstuffs? Who is responsible for keeping this standard?

Regulation EC 852/2004

Lays out good hygiene practices in:

• Primary production (i.e. farming), transport, storage, and handling

• Post-primary production (slaughterhouse, processing plants, retailers)

Primary responsibilty for food safety rests with the food business operator (FBO)

Which regulation has SPECIFIC hygiene rules for food products of ANIMAL origin?

Regulation EC 853/2004

Products of animal origin can only be placed on the market if:

• They are prepared and handled in registered establishments

• They have a health mark (placed by competent authority) and an identity mark (placed on packaging by FBO)

Lays out specific requirements for:

• meat (sections I:VI)

• bivalve molluscs (section VII)

• fishery products (section VIII)

• dairy (section IX)

• eggs (section X) …

Which regulation verifies COMPLIANCE with rules on food and feed law, animal health and welfare, plant health, and ABPs?

Regulation EU 2017 / 625

Verifies:

• risk-based approaches

• ‘farm to fork’

• assessment of procedures based on 

  • good hygiene practices 

  • principles of hazard analysis critical control points (HACCP)

• staff performing official controls must be trained on the application of HACCP procedures

What is a food safety management system (FSMS)?

A food safety management system is a set of interacting elements forming a network to ensure that food presents a minimal risk to consumers…

What are the key elements of a FSMS?

• Prerequisite programs (PRPs)

  • Good hygiene practices (GHPs)

  • Other (traceability, recall/withdrawal, training)

  • Operational prerequisite programs (oPRPs)

• Procedures based on the hazard analysis and critical control point (HACCP) principles

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Recal → When the product has reached consumers / market

Withdrawal → hasn’t made it to market, but sstill in supply chain

Think of a few examples of GHP…

• Infrastructure (building, equipment)

• Cleaning and disinfection

• Pest control

• Raw materials (supplier selection, specifications)

• Technical maintenance and calibration

• Physical and chemical contaminations from production environment

• Allergens

• Food redistribution and donation

• Waste management

• Water and air control

• Personal (hygiene, health status)

• Temperature control of working and storage environment

• Working methodology

• Food safety culture

  • Amendment to reg 852/2004; this is no longer required in the UK after brexit

  • Allow for employees to raise concerns about food safety issues

Think of some examples of oPRPs…

• Cleaning of surfaces in direct contact with ready-to-eat foods

  • Compared to cleaning of floors and walls

• Bacteriological quality of water used to irrigate ready-to-eat crops 

  • Compared to water used to irrigate crops intended to be consumed after heat treatment

What are the seven principles (steps) of a hazard analysis and critical control point (HACCP)?

Principle 1: Conduct a hazard analysis and identify control measures

• Creating a step-by-step control plan

Principle 2: Determine the critical control points (CCPs)

• Which of these steps is critical to control the hazards? (creating your CCPs)

Principle 3: Establish critical limits

• Ex: temp

Principle 4: Establish a system to monitor control of CCPs

• Establish a system to MONITOR those critical limits

Principle 5: Establish corrective actions to be taken when monitoring indicates a deviation

• What to do when those CCPs are broken

Principle 6: Validate the HACCP plan and establish verification procedures

• Create a system to validate your HACCP plan and establish verification procedures to ensure its actually working

Principle 7: Establish documentation and record keeping

What are the 5 steps that should PRECEDE your HACCP to determine the risk of your food? Describe these:

1) Assemble a HACCP team

• The HACCP team is responsible for developing and maintaining a HACCP plan; know the production process of that food and understand hazards associated with it

2) Describe the end product

• Raw materials / ingredients

• Production process involved

• Packaging

• Distribution and storage conditions

• Other (shelf life, microbiological criteria)

3) Define intended use by consumer

• Consider suitability to specific consumer groups

4) Construct a flow diagram

• Present the entire production process of that food in a flow diagram (see image)

5) On-site confirmation of flow diagram

• HACCP team needs to confirm that flow diagram reflects the production process on-site

Describe what is done during principle 1 of your HACCP?

Principle 1 (step 6) - Conduct a hazard analysis and identify control measures

Hazards that can occur at each step of the process are analyzed:

• Probability of occurence and its severity (the risk)

• Acceptable / tolerable levels of the hazard in the product

• Potential for survival and multiplication of biological hazards

• Other factors (i.e. intended use)

Example of this is the first table in the associated CRW

Describe what is done during principle 2 of your HACCP?

Principle 2 (step 7) - Determine the critical control points (CCPs) for the hazards identified during production

CCP = a step at which a control measure, essential to the control of a significant hazard, is applied in an HACCP system

Identification of a CCP should be done asking yourself the questions seen in the flow chart

Describe what is done during principle 3 of your HACCP?

Principle 3 (step 8) - Establish critical LIMITS

Critical limits separate acceptable (likely safe) from unacceptable (likely unsafe) products

• Must be objective, based on scientific evidence, and be MEASUREABLE or OBSERVABLE

• Examples:

  • Milk pasteurisation (Reg. (EC) 853/2004): 

    • a high temperature for a short time: at least 72 °C for 15 seconds

    • a low temperature for a long time: at least 63 °C for 30 minutes

  • Acidification of raw egg products (pH ≤ 4.2 for mayonnaise)

Describe what is done during principle 4 of your HACCP?

Principle 4 (step 9) - Establish a system or monitor control of CCPs

CCPs must be monitored by measurement or observation

• Monitoring should enable TIME detection of deviations, and prompt corrective action

• For each CCP, the HACCP plan should indicate:

  • What should be monitored

  • Who should perform the monitoring

  • When should CCPs be monitored

  • How should they be monitored

Describe what is done during principle 5 of your HACCP?

Principle 5 (step 10) - Establish corrective actions

When CCPs are breached, need to consider:

• Safety of the product since last monitored (past)

• How to re-establish control (present)

• Root cause analysis to avoid a recurrence (future)

For each breach of CCP, the HACCP plan should indicate:

• What corrective action should be implemented

• Who is responsible for implementing corrective action

• When should corrective action be implemented (usually immediately)

• How corrective action should be implemented

Describe what is done during principle 6 of your HACCP?

Principle 6 (step 11) - Validate the HACCP plan and establish verification procedures

• Validation → is BEFORE production

  • Definition: obtaining ecidence that a control measure, or combination of control measures, is capable of controlling the hazard for a specific outcome

    • Ex: experimental evidence that the process will eliminate the hazard

• Verification → happens DURING production

  • Definition: the application of methods, procedures, tests, and other evaluations (in addition to monitoring) to determine whether a control measure has been operating as intended

    • Ex: regular laboratory tests on the end product indicating absence of the hazard

Describe what is done during principle 7 of your HACCP?

Principle 7 (step 12) - Establish documentation and record keeping

• Documents and records that verify and demonstrate compliance with the HACCP plan:

  • HACCP team composition

  • Hazards analyses outcomes and justification

  • Justification for establishment of CCPs, control measures and critical limits

  • CCP monitoring activities

  • Corrective actions taken following identified deviations

  • Outcomes of verification procedures

  • Updates to the HACCP plan

What is the objective of a food safety management system audit? What are the key requirements for this audit?

To verify compliance with food safety and animal health / welfare standards

Key audit reqirements:

• Risk-based assesment (in compliance with Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2019/627)

• Informative to both FBO and Competent Authority

• Consistent

• Accurate

What are the 4 compliance ratings a facility could get in regards to their food management system?

• Good

  • No issues of significance for public health, animal health or animal welfare

• Generally satisfactory

  • No immediate issues of significance for public health, animal health or animal welfare identified on the day of the audit. Any NCs identified during the audit period corrected promptly

• Improvement Necessary

  • Major NCs identified at audit and/or NCs during the audit period not always responded to and corrected promptly

• Urgent improvement necessary

  • Multiple major NCs or critical NC identified during audit visit or interim audit period. Official intervention required to ensure public health safeguards.