ISO 22000
ISO 22000;2005 – Food Safety Management Systems
Requirements for any Organisation in the Food Chain.
This international standard specifies the requirements for a food safety management system that combines the key elements of food safety along the food chain up to the point of final consumption. It includes requirements for:
- Interactive communication
- System management
- Prerequisite programmes
- HACCP priniciples
It has been aligned with ISO 9001 (Quality Management Systems) and HACCP, combining the HACCP Plan with Prerequisite Programmes.
It is applicable to all organisations, regardless of size, which are involved in any aspect of the food chain and want to implement systems that consistently provide safe products.
This includes but is not limited to feed producers, harvesters, farmers, producers of ingredients, food manufacturers, retailers, food services, catering services, organisations providing cleaning and sanitation services, transportation, storage and distribution services, suppliers of equipment, suppliers of cleaning and sanitising agents, packaging manufacturers and converters, etc.
The scope is therefore enormous and as such the standard cannot give specific requirements for different sectors of the food chain. The possibility of misinterpretation of a standard with such a wide scope certainly exists. This has been overcome to some extent by reference to sector specific codes of practice and guidelines.
Some food industry professionals have criticised the standard due to it concentrating on the management system requirements and not on the standards to be achieved. The uptake has therefore been quite varied, with some sectors adopting it as a relevant Certification requirement and others having a very slow uptake.
One main advantage seen by several of Effective Control Ltd’s clients is that the same Certification Body may offer combined audits for IS0 22000 with ISO 9001, IS0 14001, and OHSAS/ISO 18000, hence reducing the resource that needs to be committed to multiple audits that often have duplicated system requirements.
In the UK packaging sector the uptake of ISO 22000 has been slow due to the apparent reluctance of the major retailers to accept anything other than their own BRC/IoP Global Standard for Packaging and Packaging Materials.
It is considered that companies that are already certificated to ISO 9001 and the BRC/IoP Global Standard will have little problem achieving certification to ISO 22000.
Consultancy and Training – Effective Control Ltd offer bespoke consultancy and training packages to help you achieve successful certification to ISO 22000. This involves undertaking an initial Gap Analyses to identify actions required, followed by help with implementation of actions including systems development and training of the Food Safety Manager and Team. Integration with existing management systems is a priority to avoid unnecessary duplication.