Food Safety jargon


   27 Shawal 1427 (H) Equal 18 November 2006 (G)

Food Safety jargon

What is a food safety program?

A food safety program is a collection of documents that show how you have identified and managed your food safety risks. The food safety program may include

  • staff training records
  • procedures that show how to do a task e.g. how to clean an oven, how to receive food in the business, how to store food
  • worksheets that show when a task has been completed e.g. temperature monitoring, cleaning schedule
  • Hazard analysis critical control point records that explain how you identified what could go wrong with foods in the business and what steps are taken to make sure that things do not go wrong!
  • administration records detailing who works in the business, who supplies food to the business, what is in products made
  • Documents that show you regularly check the system is working.

What is a food recall?

Sometimes manufacturers need to recall food from the marketplace because it may be unsafe or it does not meet quality specifications.

Examples of food safety recalls include

· small goods recalled because they are found to contain food poisoning bacteria,

· Foods that are found to contain allergens such as peanuts that have not been declared on the label.

Examples of quality recalls include

  • biscuits recalled because they are the wrong shape or size
  • tinned peas that are missing a color and so appear white not green

for more information: www.foodstandards.gov.au

HACCP

This stands for Hazard Analysis Critical Control Point. This is an internationally accepted system of

· identifying what can go wrong with food at each stage of its processing,

· working out how to control the process,

· putting in procedures so the food is safe at all stages of production,

· recording what happens so you can learn from mistakes and

· constantly improving the system so the risk of something going wrong becomes less and less and less

HACCP in a nutshell means, spot the hazard, assess the risk, make the changes!

For more information: www.haccpalliance.org

Codex Alimentarius

Codex Alimentarius is an international committee established by the World Health Organisation and the Food and Agriculture Organisation. Codex representatives from each country get together to develop international food standards to improve health and facilitate trade in food around the world.

For more information: www.codexalimentarius.net