What is HACCP?

HACCP - Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Point systemnnHACCP Legislation in Australia affects all businesses handling or preparing food. The legislation is national and extremely important for customers to understand because in the event of food poisoning, if customers are not HACCP compliant, they can be held liable from a legal perspective. To be HACCP compliant, customers must do the following when dealing with food:

• Identify hazards and access their severity and risks.
• Determine critical control points - know where the risks are.
• Institute control measures and establish critical limits to ensure control.
  • What safety checks are required.
  • Check that the risks are reduced to stop things going wrong.
• Monitor critical control points - check that things don't go wrong.
• Take pre-determined action whenever monitoring results indicate critical points are breached - fix the problem.
• Establish a record system.
• Verify the system is functioning as planned.

nnHigh Risk PointsnHigh-risk points are the growth of bacteria during storage, therefore under HACCP, safety limits have been introduced to determine the point at which food is acceptable and unacceptable. Businesses must monitor the temperature of the food and storage facilities to ensure that the safety limits are met. An example of a safety limit is a high risk or perishable food must be received at or below 5ºC and then stored within the same limits. A frozen food must be received at or below -15ºC. Safety checks are the checks that put in place to determine the foods do not breach the safety limits. There are many display refrigeration systems still in use today that use “cold plates” which only refrigerate products that are in contact with the stainless steel surface. There is NO refrigeration in the rest of the cabinet and yet customers stack food above this safety load limit line because they are not aware of the facts. A simple temperature test will alert them to the dangers and associated risks!nnExamples of safety checks:

• Inspection and temperature checks of food on delivery.
• Inspection and temperature checks of refrigerators, hot food cabinets, display cases and ain-maries.
• Internal temperature checks of food when cooked reheated or chilled.
• Corrective action must be taken if safety limits are not met. This action should be recorded, dated and signed off.

Once the safety program is established it needs to be monitored. Any display case, or vehicle used to store perishable food, must be checked regularly and records kept.nnSuggested HACCP solutions:

• Preventative maintenance service to refrigeration equipment.
• Electric data logger to record temperature and if used in conjunction with an alarm, such as 'Carel Plant Watch', which rings a customer's mobile phone or designated person to fix any problem that may occur.
• Thermometers will also be required to probe food to ensure that it is at correct temperature.

For further information on the safe handling and storage of foods see the website of Foods Standard Australia New Zealand. Please visit http://www.foodstandards.gov.au n