Loma Systems urges food companies to review inspection equipment and procedures in line with BRC’s latest standard.
As official partner of the British Retail Consortium (BRC) Global Standards organization, Loma Systems is offering comprehensive advice and expertise to support food companies needing to review and adhere their inspection equipment and procedures following the release of BRC Global Standard for Food Safety Issue 7.
Published on January 7, the new BRC Global Standard for Food Safety, which includes changes to inspection guidelines, comes into effect from 1 July 2015 when the 22,000 BRC certificated food manufacturers and processors across 123 countries will need to start preparing for audits against issue 7.
Loma is widely recognised as being at the forefront of high performance metal detection, check weighing and X-ray inspection technology for the global food industry. As a result, the company who works closely with the BRC can offer advice and guidance to managers and operators at BRC certificated sites who might need to update their inspection processes or equipment to meet the latest recommendations.
Tony Bryant, UK Sales Manager at Loma comments:
“The increasing risks associated with food quality and safety has been underlined by several very high profile scares in the last few years. The BRC Global Standard is used as the benchmark for quality management systems across thousands of manufacturing sites around the world and helps food companies demonstrate their food safety credentials by having robust procedures in place”.
BRC Global Standard for Food Safety is a single, internationally recognised food safety management system and issue 7 includes a number of recommendations for further improvements to quality management programmes.
In relation to foreign body detection, it tightens the control of having an automated reject system on inspection systems and there is further recognition for the use of X-ray Inspection Systems. The standard also highlights that where metal detectors are incorporated on conveyors, test pieces should be passed as close as possible to the centre of the metal detector aperture, which is in line with Loma’s best practice.
In addition, there is an increased focus on the safety of raw ingredients. Supply chains for products have become increasingly complex, often including raw materials from around the world and may include agents or brokers as intermediaries. The BRC believes this has led to a lack of transparency which becomes apparent too often when there is an issue requiring full traceability of a raw material.
Retailers and Food Service companies now require more information about the source of raw materials used in their products and confidence in the food safety systems operated by those suppliers. As a result, issue 7 has extended the requirements for traceability to include assurances about the traceability system operated by raw material suppliers.
“These updated regulations are part of the ongoing changes to ensure food is contaminant free. Reflecting the evolving food safety landscape, our comprehensive knowledge and understanding is key to any food factories operating HACCP and BRC regulations, as well as meeting retailers’ Codes of Practice”, says Tony Bryant.
He adds:
“As official partner to BRC Global Standard for Food Safety and working closely with the major retailers, we are ideally placed to help food manufacturers, processors and packers, including raw ingredient producers, meet and even exceed inspection requirements”.
The focus of attention for Issue 7
• continuing to ensure consistency of the audit process
• providing a Standard with the flexibility to include additional voluntary modules to reduce the audit burden
• encouraging sites to put systems in place to reduce their exposure to fraud
• encouraging greater transparency and traceability in the supply chain
• encouraging adoption of the Standard as a means of improving food safety in small sites and facilities where processes are still in development.
The requirements of Issue 7 of the Standard are an evolution from previous issues, with a continued emphasis on management commitment, a Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Point (HACCP) – based food safety programme and supporting quality management system.
The objective has been to direct the focus of the audit towards the implementation of good manufacturing practices within the production areas with increased emphasis on areas which have traditionally resulted in recalls and withdrawals (e.g. label and packing management).
David Brackston BRC Global Standards Technical Director, said:
“The development of Issue 7 has been based on the values of the previous issues while ensuring that the update reflects the latest best practices.“
The BRC Global Standard for Food Safety Issue 7 will be available on BRC Participate, along with the Interpretation Guideline and additional supporting publications. Recently launched, BRC Participate offers immediate access to all documents relevant to a particular Standard, linking them clause by clause. Printed copies and PDF downloads are also available for purchase from the BRC Bookshop. http://www.youtube.com/embed/3J8nyoGnjmkhttp://www.youtube.com/embed/tQUrda70Et4
