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This information can be used to develop food safety and quality programs that meet the requirements of modern Regulatory, Customer and Industry Standards:
When considering the hazards associated with the process steps in the HACCP plans, the three traditional groupings of hazards to consider include biological, chemical, and physical hazards. As HACCP plans evolve and customer standards and regulatory requirements become more stringent, allergens, regulatory hazards, quality hazards, and engineering hazards are also commonly considered in HACCP Plans.
Food allergies only affect a relatively small percentage of the population but can be life-threatening under certain circumstances. Allergens are contained within many different foods and food ingredients, but can also be introduced into foods through inappropriate production scheduling, raw material contamination, ineffective raw material, product and work in progress identification and traceability, and in-effective cleaning and sanitation programs. Allergen management programs should be applied with the intent of controlling and managing the use of allergenic materials, production processes, and prerequisite programs within any food business.
Historical food safety and quality management systems utilized Cross Contamination as a term to define allergen interactions; Contemporary food safety and quality management systems use the term Cross Contact, as this defines that there may be an acceptable limit of presence for specified allergens within a particular foodstuff. The term Cross Contamination generally denotes the un-acceptable presence of a substance within foodstuffs.
You may also find further specific relevant information within the Allergen Management element of haccp.com.
The following section covers key considerations for potential Food Allergen hazards within a documented HACCP Plan based on common process steps:
If your food business supplies foodstuffs manufactured to a customer’s specifications, it is important to consider any specific HACCP: Allergen Hazards Management Development requirements in relation to their items.
Document: A document provides guidance and/or direction for performing work, making decisions, or rendering judgments that affect the safety or quality of the products or services that customers receive.
Documented policies, procedures, work instructions, and schedules form the basis of any food safety and quality management system. The following documentation formats may be considered to ensure ongoing compliance with specified requirements for HACCP: Allergen Hazards Management:
If your food business supplies foodstuffs manufactured to a customer’s specifications, it is important to consider any specific HACCP: Allergen Hazards Management Documentation requirements in relation to their items.
You may wish to visit the HACCP: Allergen Hazards Management Templates section of haccp.com for examples of HACCP: Allergen Hazards Management documentation, record and resource formats commonly applied within food safety and quality systems.
Implementation: Implementation is the application of documented food safety and quality system elements into the actual business operation.
The implementation of HACCP: Allergen Hazards Management within any food business requires genuine commitment from senior management, staff, and visitors to ensure the nominated goals of implementation are achievable on an ongoing basis. It is a step that requires significant planning and consideration of general and specific food business circumstances to ensure the outcomes of HACCP: Allergen Hazards Management do not negatively impact the safety and quality of the food items dispatched from the business.
Implementation of HACCP: Allergen Hazards Management must include a clear definition of responsibilities and authorities for all levels of participation by senior management, staff, and visitors to the site.
When implementing HACCP: Allergen Hazards Management within the food safety and quality system, you may wish to consider the following requirements before completion:
If your food business supplies foodstuffs manufactured to a customer’s specifications, it is important to consider any specific HACCP: Allergen Hazards Management Implementation requirements in relation to their items.
Monitoring: Monitoring is the act of reviewing and confirming measurable parameters of a defined process or product status.
Monitoring requirements within food industry sectors are generally identified against limits of acceptability defined within HACCP plans, implementation procedures, and work instructions. Monitoring usually includes some element of record-keeping, which may be maintained manually or through digital systems. It is important to consider that advancements in technology have spawned many systems and processes which are self-monitored and or self-adjusted when variances are identified. Regardless of the system used; The goal of any monitoring activity is to provide sufficient evidence that any limit of acceptability has been met.
Traditional HACCP: Allergen Hazards Management monitoring requirements include manual recording and the application of corrective actions when the results of monitoring are found to be outside acceptable limits. Corrective Actions should also generally be strongly linked to the monitoring process where applied to ensure full traceability of the applied actions.
Common monitoring activities and record formats may apply to HACCP: Allergen Hazards Management:
You may wish to visit the HACCP: Allergen Hazards Management Templates section of haccp.com for examples of HACCP: Allergen Hazards Management documentation, record and resource formats commonly applied within food safety and quality systems.
Corrective Action: Corrective action is mandatory action to be taken when a deviation to the Quality System occurs, particularly to a Critical Control Point.
Preventative Action: At any step in the process where a hazard has been identified, preventative action must be put into place to prevent re-occurrence
Corrective Action and Preventative Action are implemented to ensure that any identified non-conformance issues are documented, investigated, and rectified within appropriate time frames. Corrective action is any action applied to regain control over a product, process, policy, or procedure that has been identified as being non-conforming or outside nominated limits of acceptability. Preventative action is any action applied to prevent any identified non-conformance from reoccurring.
The outcomes of corrective and preventative actions should result in regained process control after effective application. Specified corrective actions are commonly linked to the HACCP Plans and the food business certification process.
Below are Corrective Action and Preventative Action examples which may be associated with HACCP: Allergen Hazards Management related non-conformance:
If your food business supplies foodstuffs manufactured to a customer’s specifications, it is important to consider any specific HACCP: Allergen Hazards Management Corrective Action requirements in relation to their items.
You may wish to visit the Corrective Action and Preventative Action section of haccp.com for examples of best practice applications for this food safety and quality system element.
Verification: The act of reviewing, inspecting, testing, checking, auditing, or otherwise establishing and documenting whether items, processes, services, or documents conform to specified requirements.
Verification is the detailed review of all food safety and quality system elements to confirm that they are effectively developed, documented, implemented, monitored, and reviewed. All food safety and quality system elements, including documented policies, procedures, training, HACCP plans and their operational applications must be verified on an ongoing scheduled basis. The verification process commonly includes a defined schedule for which verification activities are required, how often they are conducted, who is responsible, and detailed documented procedures for each nominated verification activity.
The general goal of an established verification process is to ensure any systemic non-conformance issues are identified and rectified within an appropriate time frame. When non-conformance issues are identified through the verification process, Corrective Actions and Preventative Actions should be implemented to ensure they do not impact the effectiveness of the food safety and quality system.
The following examples of verification activities may apply to HACCP: Allergen Hazards Management:
If your food business supplies foodstuffs manufactured to a customer’s specifications, it is important to consider any specific HACCP: Allergen Hazards Management Verification requirements in relation to their items.
You may wish to visit the Verification Activities section of haccp.com for examples of best practice applications for this food safety and quality system element.
Validation: The process of gathering evidence to provide a scientific basis for the documented act of demonstrating that a procedure, process, and activity will consistently lead to the expected results. It often includes the qualification of systems and equipment.
Validation is the provision of evidence to support the limits of control or acceptability for food safety or quality parameters nominated within systemic elements. Limits of control or acceptability are commonly included within documented food safety and quality systems elements such as procedures, HACCP plans, and specifications.
Common sources of validation include regulatory and legislative standards, finished product specifications and customer requirements, industry codes of practice and guidelines, verified and validated research, historical product, and process control outcomes, and analytical testing.
The general goal of an established validation process is to ensure any systemic non-conformance issues are identified and rectified within an appropriate time frame. When non-conformance issues are identified through the verification process, Corrective Actions and Preventative Actions should be implemented to ensure they do not impact the effectiveness of the food safety and quality system.
Validation activities are commonly defined within the verification schedules and procedures of established food safety and quality management systems.
The following examples may apply to validation of the limits of control or acceptability for HACCP: Allergen Hazards Management:
You may wish to visit the Validation Activities section of haccp.com for examples of best practice applications for this food safety and quality system element.
Skills and Knowledge: Skills and knowledge are attributes of human interactions commonly linked to competency within any specified job-related task.
Training and Training and competency requirements for HACCP: Allergen Hazards Management must be ongoing, including regularly scheduled reviews to ensure the effectiveness of training and competency outcomes.
Team members who have defined responsibilities regarding HACCP: Allergen Hazards Management should have a knowledge including:
Team members who have defined responsibilities regarding HACCP: Allergen Hazards Management should have skills including:
Team members who have defined responsibilities regarding HACCP: Allergen Hazards Management should have access to resources including:
If your food business supplies foodstuffs manufactured to a customer’s specifications, it is important to consider any specific HACCP: Allergen Hazards Management Training, Competency, and Resources requirements in relation to their items.
You may wish to visit the Training, Competency, and Resources section of haccp.com for examples of best practice applications for this food safety and quality system element.
haccp.com was created to support food businesses and food industry professionals in achieving and maintaining the stringent requirements of food industry compliance.