Global Food Safety Initiative – Preparation for FSSC 22000. Part 4 ISO22000 Section 6, Resource Management

6.0 Resource Management

This clause is about making sure there are enough resources to meet the needs of the FSMS in terms of:

• People
• Infrastructure
• Work Environment

6.2.1 General

The food safety team and the other personnel carrying out activities having an impact on food safety shall be competent and shall have appropriate education, training, skills and experience.

Where the assistance of external experts is required for the development, implementation, operation or assessment of the food safety management system, records of agreement or contracts defining the responsibility and authority of external experts shall be available.

This section is about making sure that the people within the factory have the right skills, competencies and training to carry out their role in the FSMS.

Role profiles should clearly define skills and competency requirements for the factory. 

• The main process used to assess people’s skills and competency levels is the Performance Development Process (PDP);
• FSMS continuous improvement should be incorporated into PDP goals;
• Additional local processes will also need to be defined were PDP process has not been fully implemented, and is not followed due to local statutory or regulatory requirements;
• Skills and competencies of all who are responsible for food safety must be evaluated and documented,
• If there are any gaps in skills and competencies found after the PDP process or other evaluation, then there must be training given to close those gaps.
  • Internal / External Training
  • Courses
  • These can be awareness sessions or full training, dependent on the level required
  • On-the-job Training

Required skills, competencies and training must be documented for anyone responsible for food safety 

For Example:

• Operators monitoring CCP’s
• Operators performing cleaning and disinfection
• Operators performing analysis required for release of product

Must document how skills and competencies are assessed and how gaps are closed.

6.2.2 Competence, awareness and training

1. Identify the necessary competencies for personnel whose activities have an impact on food safety – JOB DESCRIPTION/SKILL MATRIX
2. Provide training or take other action to ensure personnel have the necessary competencies – Example: CCP monitoring training
3. Ensure that personnel responsible for monitoring, corrections and corrective actions of the food safety management system are trained – TRAINING
4. Evaluate the implementation and the effectiveness of 1), 2) and 3) – Examples: Records review, Direct observation verification audits
5. Ensure that the personnel are aware of the relevance and importance of their individual activities in contributing to food safety – TRAINING
6. Ensure that the requirement for effective communication (see 5.6) is understood by all personnel whose activities have an impact on food safety – Train personnel to communicate change to food safety team
7. Maintain appropriate records of training and actions – Records of all training and corrective actions/ retraining

• In all instances, the effectiveness of training must be assessed. There are different techniques which can be used, example:
  • Audit (most effective)
  • Exam/questions at the end of a training course

6.3 Infrastructure

The organization shall provide the resources for the establishment and maintenance of the infrastructure needed to implement the requirements of this International Standard.

6.4 Work environment

The organization shall provide the resources for the establishment, management and maintenance of the work environment needed to implement the requirements of this International Standard.

6.3 Infrastructure & 6.4 Work environment 

• These particular clauses are covered by pre-requisite programs which are in place within the factory
• Number of standards must be developed which cover these areas:

• The factory needs to make sure that they
  
  • Meet the mandatory requirements, as defined within the Quality Management System standards
  • Any local statutory/regulatory requirements
  • Customer requirements
  • Any additional local requirements, as defined by risk assessment/HACCP

ISO 22000 Section 7. Planning and realization of safe products

7.1 General

The organization shall plan and develop the processes needed for the realization of safe products.

The organization shall implement, operate and ensure the effectiveness of the planned activities and any changes to those activities. This includes PRP(s) as well as operational PRP(s) and/or the HACCP plan.

• Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Points Applies to this section;
• Codex Alimentarius Recommended  International  Code of Practice General  Principles Of Food Hygiene CAC/RCP 1-1969, Rev. 4-20031 also applies to this section.

7.2 Prerequisite programs

Required prerequisite programs will be covered in detail when we review ISO/TS 22002-1. Factories must have SOP’s for each prerequisite program.

7.3 Preliminary steps to enable hazard analysis

Food safety team

7.3.2 Food safety team

A food safety team shall be appointed.

The food safety team shall have a combination of multi-disciplinary knowledge and experience in developing and implementing the food safety management system. This includes, but need not be limited to, the organization’s products, processes, equipment and food safety hazards within the scope of the food safety management system.

Records shall be maintained that demonstrate that the food safety team has the required knowledge and experience (see 6.2.2).

Food safety team members

• Motivated to be advocates for food safety
• Foster culture of food safety & quality
• Cascade food safety issues to their departments

Food safety team activities Examples

Food safety team activity documentation Examples

• Internal audits
  • Track open actions and repeat issues
• Meeting minutes
  • Track open actions
• Focused Improvements
• HACCP Reassessments
• Incident CAPA

7.3.3 Product Characteristics

7.3.3.1 Raw materials, ingredients and product-contact materials

• Interspec includes descriptions of ingredients as appropriate
• Ingredient Hazard Analysis (HA)
• Documented in the ingredient analysis hazard analysis worksheet in operational HACCP template
• Quality can coordinate HA for similar ingredients
• May group ingredient types if hazards are the same
• Product contact surfaces must be considered in the process hazard analysis. Hygienic engineering and maintenance is a Prerequisite program (PRP)

7.3.3.2 Characteristics of end products

The HACCP standard includes requirements for documenting the characteristics of end products included in the operational HACCP template.

HACCP Standard

The requirements for clause 7.3.3.2 are documented in the operational HACCP template terms of reference worksheet.

HACCP Template Terms of Reference

7.3.4 Intended use

HACCP Template Product Description and Intended Use

The requirements for clause 7.3.4 are documented in the operational HACCP description of product and intended use worksheets.

7.3.5.1 Flow diagrams

Flow diagrams can be pasted into or created in flow diagram worksheet of the HACCP template.

• A detailed description of the process steps and control measures should be included in Interspec and factory work instructions and procedures.
• A general description of the process including all steps necessary for food safety must be included in the processing method field of the product description and intended use worksheet.

If there is not enough space in the processing method field you can reference a processing method document and include it in your HACCP manual.