instore - January 2016 - (Page CI8)

Food Safety: Ready For FSMA 2016 By Bob Sims f a facility manufactures or processes food, FSMA will impact almost every facet of its food production. The Food Safety Modernization Act (FMSA) was put in place in 2011 by President Obama to make America's food supply safer for consumption. Compliance dates will vary according to the size of the facility, but all facilities registered with the FDA will need to comply. I Facilities need to be aware of FSMA in detail, not only to be compliant with the law, but to ensure safe food for the American public. Mike Nolan, technical director at ASI Food Safety provides a few of the new, soon-to-come and key points that facilities need to know about. Mandatory Training For the first time in history, the FDA will require food safety training for employees working in food production and manufacturing facilities. "It's two different levels of training," Nolan says. "One is a highly qualified individual, and the other is a qualified individual." The basic definitions of the two levels are: Highly qualified individual - an individual who has had risk-based training on how to establish a risk-based preventative food safety program. The training needs to be documented and can come from something like HACCP training or job training. Most likely a given facility will have one or two people at this level. Qualified individual - the individual actually doing the work. The qualified individuals will need evidence that they've been trained in things like hand washing and other personal hygiene based procedures. 8 * JANUARY 2016 * "The training is going to be a bigger portion in the future," Nolan says. Hazard, Risk Analysis All facilities will need to do a hazard, also known as risk, analysis of their entire process. "The entire process would include everything from ingredients, to packaging, to the processes themselves," Nolan says. Once a facility completes its analysis, they will need to put preventative measures into place to mitigate the risk(s). Next, facilities will need to verify the mitigation process. "That's probably going to be the biggest impact, the risk-based preventative control. It's called (Hazard Analysis and Risk-based Control Point) HARPC," Nolan says. "So, whatever risk the facility has identified, they need to show that they've mitigated that risk and then verify that the mitigation is working." While HARPC differs from Hazard Analysis Critical Control Point (HACCP), the two hazard control systems are similar. "Even though you can have a critical control point under HARPC, it's a little less restrictive than HACCP," Nolan says. The hazard analysis concepts are very similar and the flow diagram is similar, but HAPRC has fewer requirements, he adds. The other aspect of HARPC that facilities should understand is that HAPRC relates to products and not facilities. "So you can have a facility that manufactures 15 products and maybe only three of those products would have a HAPRC and the others would not," Nolan says. Challenges The biggest challenges that producers will face are documents that the gov- commissary INSIDER PHOTOS: SHUTTERSTOCK ernment has yet to present. "Those will give us a lot more information," Nolan says. "One of them has to do with environmental swabbing, and that's another part of FSMA that's going to impact people." Environmental swabbing entails identifying a number of areas in the facility (50 or so, Nolan says) and swabbing them to find out whether or not you've got any pathogenic organisms such as listeria. "You've got to have a program, and a lot of manufacturers I talk to about environmental swabbing tell me that they don't want to know," Nolan says. "That's dangerous. They'll say, 'If I don't swab it then I won't have to deal with it.' That's scary, but some facilities take that approach." Addition Another point of FSMA to note is the addition of radiological risk. Facilities will need to find out how far away their location is from the nearest power plant and if they are within fallout range of a nuclear facility. "The biggest part has to do with whether or not a facility gets its water from a well," Nolan says. "They're going to need to make sure they test the well water for radiation." In certain parts of the country, radon is also an issue. The government added this piece to FSMA after the tsunami in Japan caused issue with a nuclear facility there. The US has never had a recall for radiation poisoning, Nolan adds.

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of instore - January 2016

instore - Jan + Feb 2016
Editor's Note - Gourmet Domination
Table of Contents
News - On Our Radar
Product Spotlight - Breads and Rolls
Product Knowledge - Fresh on the Side
Merchandising - Merchandising Madness
Comissary Insider - Insight Insider: From small scale to big time
Research and Development: Packing in the Protein
Food Safety: Ready For FSMA 2016
Vacuum Food Packaging: Choosing the Right Solution
Dips and Spreads Spotlight: Hummus Still the King
Technology: Sous Vide
Cover Story - Time to Shine
Specialty Insights - Single-Serve Cheese
Equipment & Packaging - Interest Increasing
Product Trends
Product Showcase
Ad Index

instore - January 2016