[Practical QA Solutions] International Impact of Food Safety

With the negativity of unsafe food, one may wonder about the international impact of food safety. The short answer is that international business is stressing existing quality assurance and food safety systems, thus creating higher risks, as evidenced by the number of recalls making the daily news. Government investigations along with industry questioning of third-party food safety audits are creating new challenges.

With a weak economy comes pres-sure to maintain profits; with cutbacks in quality assurance, food safety and related personnel come higher risks and consequences; with ingredient imports and international distance come higher risks and consequences. Additional regulatory authority is indeed on the way. This authority itself creates higher risks and consequences for plant quality assurance and food safety systems. What are some practical solutions for this dilemma?

The first solution centers on ownership of responsibility to provide sufficient resources to expand established quality assurance and food safety systems to meet today’s challenges. Our food safety systems have withstood the test of time in demonstrating successful practices with food production and protection all the way to consumption. Systems must be backed with consistent ownership commitment for long-term effectiveness. In some cases business decisions must reflect not doing business with those that create risk and consequences.

Although third-party food-safety audits have been under major scrutiny lately, they have an important role in quality assurance and food safety systems, and represent an intensity of that to be evaluated. Any third-party firm must clarify the audit’s objectives for the various auditing programs. Is the audit to evaluate a basic food safety system or a specialized part within a food safety system? For example, the American Feed Industry Association (AFIA) recently implemented a Safe Feed/Safe Food (SF/SF) Certification Program with facility aud-its conducted by approved, experienced, independent personnel. The facility must agree to random unannounced audits. The facility also must agree that the program provides reasonable assurances that an inspected facility will follow its stated procedures and meet the guidelines established in the SF/SF program. This program is now recognized by FDA and likely the EU in the near future. It is an excellent approach to evaluating a basic food-safety system. (More information is available at www.afia.org.)

As with other certification programs, SF/SF is not designed to provide assurance that a facility is free of salmonella or other pathogens. Rather an in-house program should already be in place. Microbiology is a vital part of HACCP with pathogenic monitoring as a specialized part within. Third-party assessments of that part, such as salmonella, must be conducted by highly qualified personnel, with a team approach customized to the facility needs. If salmonella is a troublesome hazard of the facility, then a team (“special ops”) conducts a specialized assessment/risks/solutions of areas such as product vulnerability, facility design, ingredient sensitivity, processing (temperature/time), microbial testing adequacy, sanitation, specific cleaning practices and regulatory impact. The team should consist of individuals who have “been there/done that” within their area of quality assurance specific to the fields of microbiology, food plant sanitary design and/or regulatory affairs.

Ownership responsibility, with a well-documented food safety system and HACCP program, must be a pre-requisite for any specialized hazard assessment. It is also important to understand that a food-safety certificate designed to evaluate basics on one day does not prevent pathogens on another day.

Practical solutions are at our fingertips. It is not necessary to “re-invent” quality assurance and food safety systems. Expand-ing upon and supporting what we have in place is the best practical solution. In today’s world of instant information the risks and consequence are higher than ever.

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Additional regulatory authority is on the way. I’m not sure if this is good or bad, only time will tell. When Congress launches an investigation into protecting the nation’s food supply, industry change is certain. That change will likely be more governmental intervention of many industries. Our nation’s food supply including animal feed, pet food and human food from farm to fork will be impacted. Consumer confidence of food safety is eroding and change is necessary, provided that change represents an improvement.