Every food business has a legal duty to keep the food it produces safe. As a manager or supervisor, you are responsible for planning the controls that make this happen, and for making sure that every member of staff follows them.

This Level 3 course takes you through each step of building and running a HACCP system, from assembling a team and analysing hazards, to setting controls, checking that they work and keeping the system up to date. It is suitable for catering, retail and manufacturing businesses.

In this module you will learn about:

• What HACCP is, and where it came from.
• Food safety management systems.
• The key terms used in HACCP.
• The seven principles of HACCP, and the twelve steps used to apply them.
• The benefits of HACCP for a food business.

HACCP stands for Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Points. It is a systematic way of identifying the hazards that could make food unsafe, and putting controls in place at the points where they matter most.

HACCP was first developed in the 1960s to produce safe food for the American space programme. Rather than relying on testing the finished product, it focused on preventing problems at every stage of production.

Today it is the internationally recognised method of managing food safety, described by the Codex Alimentarius Commission and required by law.

A food safety management system is everything a business does to make sure its food is safe, written down and followed in practice.

It is built on two foundations:

• Prerequisite programmes: the basic good hygiene practices, such as cleaning, pest control, personal hygiene and supplier approval.
• The HACCP plan: the specific controls at the critical points in each process, where hazards must be controlled.

The two work together. Good prerequisites keep the general environment safe, so that the HACCP plan can focus on what is truly critical.

These terms are used throughout the course:

• Hazard: a biological, chemical, physical or allergenic agent that could make food unsafe.
• Control measure: an action that prevents, eliminates or reduces a hazard to a safe level.
• Critical Control Point, or CCP: a step where control is essential to prevent or eliminate a hazard, or reduce it to a safe level.
• Critical limit: the measurable value that separates safe from unsafe at a CCP.
• Monitoring: planned checks that a CCP is under control.
• Corrective action: what is done when monitoring shows a CCP is out of control.

Every HACCP system is built on seven principles:

• Principle 1: conduct a hazard analysis.
• Principle 2: determine the critical control points.
• Principle 3: establish critical limits.
• Principle 4: establish a system to monitor control of the critical control points.
• Principle 5: establish corrective actions.
• Principle 6: validate the plan, and establish procedures for verification.
• Principle 7: establish documentation and record keeping.

The Codex guidelines apply the seven principles in twelve logical steps. The first five are preliminary steps that lay the groundwork:

• Step 1: assemble the HACCP team and define the scope.
• Step 2: describe the product.
• Step 3: identify the intended use and the users.
• Step 4: construct a flow diagram.
• Step 5: confirm the flow diagram on site.

Steps 6 to 12 then apply the seven principles in order. This course follows the same sequence.

A well-run HACCP system helps a business to:

• Produce safe food, and protect customers from illness and injury.
• Comply with the law, and show inspectors that food safety is under control.
• Demonstrate due diligence if something goes wrong.
• Reduce waste, complaints and product recalls.
• Focus staff on the checks that really matter.
• Win the confidence of customers, retailers and suppliers.