Downloading a resource will add this resource to your resource subscriptions. You will be notified of future updates to this resource via email (you may unsubscribe at any time by clicking the unsubscribe link in the email notification, or to unsubscribe immediately from all update notifications, click here)
Downloading a resource will add this resource to your resource subscriptions. You will be notified of future updates to this resource via email (you may unsubscribe at any time by clicking the unsubscribe link in the email notification, or to unsubscribe immediately from all update notifications, click here)
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 development, documentation, and implementation of Workplace Health and Safety within food safety and quality management systems, the following information should be considered to ensure effective outcomes:
This section is not a definitive guide to Food Industry Workplace Health and Safety, rather a stimulus for the application for guidelines and regulatory requirements that are important to participants within the food sector.
Workplace Health and Safety or WHS is the discipline concerned with protecting the health and safety of all stakeholders in the workplace from exposure to hazards and risks resulting from work activities.
Rating higher on the immediate scale of importance than Food Safety and Quality, Workplace Health and Safety as a concept remains an important component as part of the Regulatory requirements of most countries. It is important to address Workplace Health and Safety concepts in relation to food businesses as they play a vital role in daily operational management as a priority for all management, employees, visitors, and contractors. As well as addressing the Regulatory requirements for Workplace Health and Safety as a part of your Food Safety and Quality Program, it should also be considered a moral obligation to ensure that everyone is working in a safe environment.
By applying the adage “prevention is better than cure”, it is possible to reduce occurrences of Workplace injury and illness. The application of a systematic approach to Workplace Health and Safety Management can significantly reduce potential Workplace Health and Safety Hazards and move towards the elimination of risk.
Once identified, Workplace Health and Safety hazards must be controlled to ensure they don’t manifest as human impacts. If suitable control measures are not possible, then the related hazards must be mitigated through other measures. It is important to consider that Personal Protective Equipment is at the bottom of the Workplace Health and Safety hierarchical ladder and should not be considered the primary control measure for workplace health and safety hazards.
It is widely recognized that the best Workplace Health and Safety results are achieved when there is a cooperation between all stakeholders regarding training and recognition of Workplace Health and Safety protocols.
Workplace Health and Safety legislation generally places extra emphasis on the employer to deliver better health and safety standards within the workplace. It is impossible to make significant improvements to workplace health and safety standards though, without involving the workforce. Some organizations use direct consultation with their employees in conjunction with industry professionals to produce favorable outcomes.
Workplace Health and Safety representatives should participate within levels of the health and safety structure and related professional development and training activities. This experience and knowledge can become a catalyst to significantly improve workplace health, safety, and welfare.
Personnel Communication and engagement protocols should also extend to Visitors and Contractors to any food business site.
Workplace Health and Safety Risk Assessment is the identification of hazards against the estimation of the risks involved. If a hazard is properly identified and the likelihood of it causing harm to a person is fully assessed, then suitable control measures can be implemented to reduce the risk of harm occurring. Workplace Health and Safety specialists use their knowledge of assessing risks to ensure workers are Workplace Health and Safety to safer and healthier working environments.
Risk Assessments can be simplified by using the Five-Step System:
There are many ways of conducting a Workplace Health and Safety risk assessment and there is no perfect way that fits all eventualities, but whatever method is used it must be suitable and sufficient. More detailed assessment systems may be used where there are greater levels of risk.
It is important to consider that Workplace Health and Safety Risk Assessment is not an exact science and you can only get out of it what you put in. Scenarios considered within a risk assessment will determine the outcomes. There are major differences between risk assessments based on Quantitative (fact-based and statistical) information and those based on Qualitative (subjective and personal judgment) scenarios and information.
Workplace Health and Safety Hazards within the Food Sector may be categorized as:
Physical Workplace Health and Safety Hazards may include direct and in-direct risk.
Direct Physical Hazards may include scenarios such as where a person is directly physically injured by a piece of equipment or through a tripping injury. Examples of direct physical hazards include burns, electric shock, fire, cuts from knives and sharp machinery, manual tasks of lifting heavy objects from the floor
In-direct Physical Hazards may include scenarios such as where a person suffers a hearing loss due to prolonged exposure to high levels of industrial noise. Other examples may include working in a hot and cold environment.
In many food sector industries, there will always be hazards with working temperatures. From one extreme to the other, the heat of working at an oven to the cold of a freezer, temperature is a serious Workplace Health and Safety issue. Too much exposure to heat in humans could result in serious fatigue, heatstroke, and even death. Similarly, too much exposure to cold can cause frostbite, hypothermia, and possible death. Extremes of temperature can cause extremes of consequence. It is the responsibility of Senior Management to ensure that all reasonable measures are taken to ensure that a comfortable working temperature is maintained.
A large volume of workplace injuries are directly attributable to manual handling, including injuries caused by excessive or inappropriate lifting, carrying, pulling, pushing, or holding of loads. Manual handling-induced injuries commonly impact the back, but can also cause severe injury to limbs, muscles, tendons, and the heart. Because associated injuries tend to take longer to heal, they potentially have a more profound effect on the longer-term health of the injured person. Manual handling injuries are not always a failure of a “weak” person, but a failure of the implemented control measures.
Many workplace injuries are also attributable to slips, trips, and falls which could be greatly reduced through the application of better housekeeping, improved signages, improved lighting, better usage of tools such as tread tapes, and improved safety footwear.
Biohazards such as infectious micro-organisms, viruses, and related toxins can have significant impacts upon human health. An example of a biological hazard would include workers working in the poultry processing industry who are exposed to biological hazards associated with handling live birds or exposure to dust and feces. The primary controls for Biological Workplace Health and Safety Hazards rely on the maintenance of Good Hygiene Practices with support from structured Training and Communication Programs for all stakeholders.
The most important factor for Food Businesses is to consider the scope of Biological Workplace Health and Safety Hazards above and beyond those directly relevant to their products or processes for Food Safety and Quality compliance. For example, an outbreak of a non-foodborne virus among workers may have a significant impact upon the business’ ability to operate though this may not have any immediate Food Safety risk.
As with many different Industry Sectors, it is commonplace for workers within the Food Sector to encounter chemicals and potentially toxic substances regularly. These chemicals and substances can be detrimental to human health if they are not handled with care.
Control of Substances Hazardous to Health regulations in most countries place specific responsibilities onto Senior Management to:
The logical hierarchal ladder of Control of Substances Hazardous to Health methodologies includes:
Prevention of Exposure by:
Control of Exposure by:
Useful information regarding Chemical Workplace Health and Safety Hazards can be found within the Safety Data Sheet formats available for Chemicals and Hazardous Materials used within the Food Sector.
Mental health is an important facet of the Management of contemporary workplaces. The consideration of Mental Health should be integrated into the risk assessment processes for Workplace Health and Safety management.
Psychosocial Workplace Health and Safety Hazards are related to the way work activities are designed, organized, and managed, as well as the economic and social contexts of work and are associated with psychiatric, psychological, and/or physical injury or illness.
Commonly applied Psychosocial Workplace Health and Safety Management strategies include strong links to the application of Food Compliance Culture. You may wish to view the Food Compliance Culture element available on haccp.com.
If your food business supplies foodstuffs manufactured to a customer’s specifications, it is important to consider any specific Workplace Health and Safety Development requirements in relation to their items.
Occupational Hazards
Accidental release of ammonia
Ammonia is used as a popular refrigerant in the food processing and manufacturing industries. Despite the various advantages, ammonia is corrosive, flammable, and explosive.
Occupational Asthma
This type of hazard is more common for workers working baking industry.
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 Workplace Health and Safety:
If your food business supplies foodstuffs manufactured to a customer’s specifications, it is important to consider any specific Workplace Health and Safety Documentation requirements in relation to their items.
You may wish to visit the Workplace Health and Safety Templates section of haccp.com for examples of Workplace Health and Safety 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 Workplace Health and Safety 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 Workplace Health and Safety do not negatively impact the safety and quality of the food items dispatched from the business.
Implementation of Workplace Health and Safety 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 Workplace Health and Safety within food safety and quality system, you may wish to consider the following requirements before completion:
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 Workplace Health and Safety 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 Workplace Health and Safety 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 be applicable to Workplace Health and Safety:
If your food business supplies foodstuffs manufactured to a customer’s specifications, it is important to consider any specific Workplace Health and Safety Monitoring requirements in relation to their items.
You may wish to visit the Workplace Health and Safety Templates section of haccp.com for examples of Workplace Health and Safety 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 in relation 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 is 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 Workplace Health and Safety Plans and the food business certification process.
Below are Corrective Action and Preventative Action examples which may be associated with Workplace Health and Safety related non-conformance:
If your food business supplies foodstuffs manufactured to a customer’s specifications, it is important to consider any specific Workplace Health and Safety 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, Workplace Health, and Safety 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 be applicable to Workplace Health and Safety:
If your food business supplies foodstuffs manufactured to a customer’s specifications, it is important to consider any specific Workplace Health and Safety 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 system elements such as procedures, Workplace Health and Safety 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 be applicable to the validation of the limits of control or acceptability for Workplace Health and Safety:
If your food business supplies foodstuffs manufactured to a customer’s specifications, it is important to consider any specific Workplace Health and Safety Validation requirements in relation to their items.
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 competency requirements for Workplace Health and Safety must be ongoing, including regular scheduled reviews to ensure the effectiveness of training and competency outcomes.
Team members who have defined responsibilities regarding Workplace Health and Safety should have knowledge including:
Team members who have defined responsibilities regarding Workplace Health and Safety should have skills including:
Team members who have defined responsibilities regarding Workplace Health and Safety 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 Workplace Health and Safety 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.