IQNet - Auditing Food Companies and Food Safety SchemesThird party audits and assessments help organisations to enhance the safety and quality of their products, processes and services. Regarding the possible impact of such audits, the food auditors and the certification bodies take over a high responsibility. Therefore, food auditors must fulfil the requirements, which are set up by standards, standards owners, certification and accreditation bodies.
Food safety standards will be further developed and will be applied by new groups of customers, with increased perception, for new products and under new constellations. A good example for this is ISO 22000. As a consequence, the number of third party certificates will continue to grow.
The result of a survey conducted among certification bodies shows major elements for improvement in food companies. Through the enlarged focus on the entire food chain (“From Farm to Fork”), new elements like interface assessments will become more and more important.
1. Introduction
Today, we count more than 100 accreditation bodies, more than 700 certification/registration bodies, and more than 700.000 management system certificates (mainly based on ISO 9001 and 14001).
The main target of all these organisations and their activities is to serve the industry and other interested organisations by reducing risks, costs (less supplier’s audits, less waste of products, higher efficiency of internal processes, better quality of products and services, increased safety of products etc.), and by improving customer satisfaction.
Auditing food companies is very demanding, which made it necessary to develop different standards with different approaches and reporting formats; examples are BRC, IFS, SQF 2000, SQF 1000, Dutch HACCP, China Retailer Specification, etc. In addition, ISO is currently developing a standard for food safety management systems (ISO 22000), which sets up “Requirements for organisations throughout the food chain” in a food safety management system.
An important element in the chain certification is the interface auditing. Therefore, ISO 22000 requests specifically an interactive communication along the food chain. Since the “Food Chain” is becoming more and more global (several products are sent almost around the world in several steps, before they reach the consumer), food chain audits with successful interface
2. IQNet-Impact on Food Auditing
IQNet partners have certified more than 200.000 organisations in 150 countries, representing 30% of all ISO 9001 and ISO 14001 certificates issued worldwide.
Thanks to this worldwide representation, IQNet partners have a vast experience in auditing food companies based on ISO 9001, ISO 14001, as well as on HACCP and other food safety standards, like BRC, BRC-IOP, IFS, HACCP 9000, Dutch HACCP, SQF 2000, SQF 1000, DS 3027, ELOT 1416:2000, FSMS, IRAM 14104, Irish Standard 343, UNI EN ISO 10854:1999, GOST R 51705, 1-2001, etc.. The number of food safety certificates issued by the IQNet partners grew within two years (from January 2003 – January 2005) by 170% up to 2.860 certificates.
IQNet is a member of CIES (The Food Business Forum). The latest annual congress, called “The World Food Business Summit”, was held in Rome, June 2004. CIES is the only independent global food business network. It serves the CEOs and senior management of 175 retailer and 175 supplier member companies in over 150 countries. The CIES retailer members alone operate 600’000 stores and generate with 4.5 million employees a turnover of more than USD 2.000 billion. IQNet upholds a participation in this important event.
In addition, IQNet is represented in the Stakeholder Group of the Global Food Safety Initiative (GFSI). GFSI was founded by a group of international retailers (members of CIES), in April 2000. The target of this group is to enhance food safety, ensure consumer protection, strengthen consumer confidence, to set requirements for food safety schemes, and to improve cost efficiency throughout the food chain. The 4th CIES International Food Safety Conference was held in Rome on 3-4 February 2005. More than 400 food experts participated in this event, where IQNet was a main sponsor. The executive summary of this conference can be downloaded from the CIES website (www.ciesnet.org, Food Safety, GFSI).
3. Auditing Food Companies
3.1. Food Standards
For each audit, a standard or a specification is requested, based on which the audit result can demonstrate conformity. Examples for specific international food standards are: ISO 15161:2001 “Guidelines on the application of ISO 9001:2000 for the food and drink industry” ISO/Committee Draft ISO/DIS 22000 “Food safety management systems – Requirements for organizations throughout the food chain”.
In addition, many national standards organisations issued their own food safety standards, like Argentina (IRAM 14104), Canada (FSMS), China (more than 20, e.g. GB17403-1998), Columbia (ICONTEC 0104-0027), Denmark (DS 3027), Greece (ELOT 1416:2000), Hungary (1-2-18/1993), Ireland (I.S.343:2000), Italy (UNI EN 10854:1999), Russia (GOST R 51705. 1-2001), USA (HACCP 9000).
Professional organisations like wholesalers use their own standards and requirements. In order to avoid the issuance of an own standard, GFSI (The Global Food Safety Initiative) created a process to approve existing standards. In spring 2005, the GFSI approval process was at the following stage:
- Approved: BRC, IFS, SQF 2000, SQF 1000
- Under consideration: Dutch HACCP, China Retail Standard, New Zealand Fresh Produce Program
- For comparison: Eurepgap
- Legal prescriptions
- Codex Alimentarius (Guidance on HACCP)
- BRC/IOP “Food Packaging”
- BRC/FDF “Genetically Modified Food Ingredients”
- BRC Product Recall Guidelines
- QS Charta of Q+S GmbH
- PBAF QC
- COCERAL etc.
Auditors in general must be competent for the function they perform (ISO/IEC Guide 62), which means that qualified food auditors are required to audit food companies.
ISO 9001:2000 for example requires that the audited “organisation shall determine statutory and regulatory requirements related to the product”. This means that the auditor must be able to qualify the conduct of legal and other requirements of this organisation. Without adequate experience, knowledge and training in food technology and food law, this task cannot be fulfilled.
The general requirements for auditors are mainly stated in ISO 19001:2002 “Guidelines for quality and/or environmental management systems auditing”. Among others, this standard gives examples for “audit objectives” and “auditor’s competence and evaluation”.
Following the audit objectives, the auditor must qualify the organisation regarding the “compliance of the audited company with legal and other requirements”. Auditor’s competence requests that the auditor knows the sector specific terminology, processes and practices. In addition, the auditors must know the characteristics of the processes, products and services in the companies they audit. This again asks for adequate experience, knowledge and training in food technology and food law.
3.3. Food Safety Audits
Auditors, who assess food companies based on standards like ISO 9001, must be experienced in food issues and in the relevant food safety schemes and requirements. Therefore, why do we need specific food safety audits? Food has always been a risky business. And the food safety audit is a perfect tool to reduce risks with limited costs. In general, we can say: Auditor’s competence = Customer’s benefit!
What makes food safety audits being successful? Some of the facts are:
- Four eyes see more than two
- Auditors are not wearing professional blinkers
- Food safety auditors are specialists
- Good checklists lead to good questions with new findings, but in some cases, no checklists lead to open questions, which provide good results
- A second opinion usually supports the internal development process, since external decisions are mostly better accepted than internal advice
- Detect deviations
- Requests for corrective and preventive actions
- Recommendations for improvement
- Overall management report
- Benchmark possibilities
- Customer recognition through certificates
- Food legislation (national and international food law)
- Sector specific training
- Food technology and analysis methods
- Calibration of testing equipment
- Food security and food safety concepts and trends
- Combined auditing: ISO 9001, ISO 14001, OHSAS 18001, food safety, and product related labels
4. Conclusion
Today, a growing number of standards and specifications are applied worldwide to demonstrate food safety and food consciousness. On the other hand, the main target of many interested organisations remains unchanged: “One standard, one audit, one certificate”.
For food companies, the wholesaler is an important driver, which requests specific standards like BRC and IFS to a larger extent. The customer is an additional driver, asking for values like organic food, GMO free, natural production methods, etc., to be proved by special labels and certificates.
Certification is based on confidence, competence, knowledge and experience of certification bodies, auditors, trainers, standards owners, and accreditation bodies. IQNet together with its partners form an important group in this community. Therefore, IQNet has the professional knowledge to comply with the requirements in the food area.
Besides assessments, labels and certificates, the real target of all these activities should never be forgotten: to provide the customers all over the world with safe and healthy food, sufficient in quantity, affordable in price, produced by using sustainable methods and procedures, and under safe and healthy working conditions.
Hans Buser
Secretary General of IQNet
Mr Hans Buser, Secretary General of IQNet, participating in the CIES World Food Business Summit, Rome, June 2004.
Plenary ready to welcome 420 food specialists, GFSI Food Safety Conference, Rome, 2-3 February 2005