HACCP, A Practical Approach

Humans have been concerned with the availability of food from the dawn of their existence. Prehistoric humans were hunters and gatherers who needed to find and catch food. As time passed, humans began to grow and preserve their own food. And still later in history, humans became concerned with preparing, conserving, and maintaining a steady supply of food. Advances in the social organization from small-group to large-group living and from nomadic hunting and gathering to communal life in a fixed place paralleled the need for a reliable source of food.
HACCP is a logical system of food control based on prevention. In identifying where the hazards are likely to occur in the process, we have the opportunity to put in place the measures needed to prevent those hazards from affecting the consumer. This facilitates the move towards a preventative quality assurance approach within a food business and reduces the traditional reliance on end-product inspection and testing.
In brief, HACCP is applied by taking a number of straightforward steps:

• Understand your product—what is making it safe?
• Look at your production process from start to finish—understand your operating environment and process activities.
• Identify potential hazards and decide where they could occur in the process.
• Put in preventative control measures with defined safety limits.
• Monitor the controls.
• Write it all down and keep records as evidence that you’ve done it.
• Ensure that it continues to work effectively.

This course covers all aspects of HACCP.