Based on the combined efforts of the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) concentrating its efforts on global nutrition, and the World Health Organization (WHO) focusing on preventing disease and promoting general well-being, the United Nations established the Codex Alimentarius Commission in 1963 to pro- vide worldwide food safety and nutrition. In Latin, Codex Alimentarius means food law or code. The Codex Alimentarius Commission provides the world with interna- tional food safety standardization, which allows the consumer to be better pro- tected and to enjoy more varieties of food products, while promoting healthy and safe choices. The Codex Alimentarius Commission is instrumental in developing and coordinating international food safety guidelines, procedures, and standards to protect the health and safety of consumers and in encouraging fair international trade around the world. The Codex Alimentarius Commission has more than 160 countries as members. These members represent 97 percent of the world popula- tion that recognizes the importance of HACCP. Following is a snapshot of the countries impacted by the power of the Codex Alimentarius Commission to facilitate international food safety. Also listed are the countries who represent Codex Ali- mentarius Commission Members:
Afghanistan Albania Algeria Angola
Antigua and Barbuda Argentina Armenia Australia Austria Bahamas Bahrain Bangladesh Barbados Belgium Belize Benin Bhutan Bolivia Botswana Brazil Brunei Darussalam Bulgaria Burkina Faso Burundi Cambodia Cameroon Canada Cape Verde
Central African Republic Chad Chile China Colombia Congo Cook Islands Costa Rica Côte d’Ivoire Croatia Cuba Cyprus Czech Republic
Democratic People’s Republic of Korea Democratic Republic of the Congo Denmark Dominica Dominican Republic Ecuador Egypt El Salvador Equatorial Guinea Eritrea Estonia Ethiopia European Community Fiji Finland France Gabon Gambia Georgia Germany Ghana Greece Grenada Guatemala Guinea Guinea-Bissau Guyana Haiti Honduras Hungary Iceland India Indonesia
Iran (Islamic Republic of) Iraq Ireland Israel Italy Jamaica Japan Jordan Kazakhstan Kenya Kiribati Kuwait Kyrgyzstan
Lao People’s Democratic Republic Latvia
Lebanon Lesotho Liberia
Libyan Arab Jamahiriya Lithuania Luxembourg Madagascar Malawi Malaysia Mali Malta Mauritania Mauritius Mexico
Micronesia (Federated States of) Mongolia Morocco Mozambique Myanmar Namibia Nepal Netherlands New Zealand Nicaragua Niger Nigeria Norway Oman Pakistan Panama
Papua New Guinea Paraguay Peru Philippines Poland Portugal Qatar Republic of Korea Republic of Moldova Romania Russian Federation Rwanda
Saint Kitts and Nevis Saint Lucia
Saint Vincent and the Grenadines Samoa Saudi Arabia Senegal Seychelles Sierra Leone Singapore Slovakia Slovenia Solomon Islands South Africa Spain Sri Lanka Sudan Suriname Swaziland Sweden Switzerland
Syrian Arab Republic Thailand
The former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia
Togo Tonga
Trinidad and Tobago Tunisia
Turkey Uganda Ukraine
United Arab Emirates United Kingdom
United Republic of Tanzania United States of America Uruguay
Vanuatu
Venezuela (Bolivarian Republic of) Vietnam
Yemen Zambia Zimbabwe
The United States’ position regarding food imports is that the country of origin must have a food safety management system, or HACCP plan, that is equal to or better than the requirements expected of a company in the United States. This raises the standards and expectations and gives countries the opportunity to sell their food products in the United States as long as these expectations are met. Some countries are distressed and look at this as a measure to impede imported products from entering certain countries.
International cooperation also helps in traceability if a contamination occurs. Var- ious countries can work together to identify, control, eliminate, and then recover from the adulteration whether deliberate or accidental. Traceability is the ability to trace the history, application, or location of an item or activity with the help of doc- umentation. Without using a precise tracking system, it would be difficult to track defective wheat from a loaf of bread back to the farm or the contaminated ham- burger patty back to a specific cow.
Additional benefits of traceability are improved supply management initiatives with electronic coding systems, increased inventory control, and methodical tracking. Retail operators often require reputable suppliers to use third-party certification and documentation to verify their traceability system. If this tracking is in place, the supplier can isolate quality issues and, more importantly, the source and extent of any food safety problems. Following are some tracking methods to facilitate traceability from farm to table:
Providing country-of-origin labeling
Evaluating production process such as free-range or dolphin-safe Requiring all manufacturers and processors to register and identify
sources
These controls help to ensure the safety of the flow of food starting at the very source of the food chain. Without these screening tools, substandard (or adulter- ated or deleterious) foods will make their way to consumers. All controls and safe- guards cannot be implemented at the last step in the flow of food—the selling or serving. Ensuring safe food requires a global team that implements controls and safeguards from farm to table.
To understand why HACCP is so important, you should familiarize yourself with its history. The Pillsbury Company, with the cooperation and participation of the Na- tional Aeronautic and Space Administration (NASA), Natick Laboratories of the U.S. Army, and the U.S. Air Force Space Laboratory Project Group, originally developed HACCP for the U.S. space program in the early 1960s. Yes, the HACCP program was actually developed by rocket scientists! They developed the program to prevent the astronauts from getting sick in space. Can you imagine an astronaut in space who is vomiting and has diarrhea? “Houston, we have a problem!”
Since all food contains microorganisms, NASA needed a food safety system that would prevent, eliminate, and reduce the number of microorganisms to safe levels to stop the astronauts from being stricken with a foodborne illness while in space. The United States space program approached 100 percent assurance against con- tamination by bacterial and viral pathogens, toxins, and chemical or physical haz- ards that could cause illness or injury to astronauts by implementing a successful HACCP plan. As a result, HACCP replaced end-product testing and provided a pre-
After NASA incorporated HACCP plans, the military, manufacturers, schools, and, in some jurisdictions, retailers have also followed suit. In the succeeding years, the HACCP system has been recognized worldwide as an effective system of controls. The system has undergone considerable analysis, refinement, and testing and is widely accepted in the United States and internationally.
Established in 1988, the National Advisory Committee on Microbiological Cri-
teria for Foods (NACMCF) is an advisory committee chartered under the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) and composed of participants from the
USDA (Food Safety and Inspection Service), Department of Health and Human Services (U.S. Food and Drug Administration and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention), the Department of Commerce (National Marine Fisheries Service), the Department of Defense (Office of the Army Surgeon General), academia, indus- try, and state employees. NACMCF provides guidance and recommendations to the Secretary of Agriculture and the Secretary of Health and Human Services re- garding the microbiological safety of foods.
In November 1992, NACMCF defined seven widely accepted HACCP principles that you should consider when developing a HACCP plan. In 1997, the NACMCF requested that the HACCP Working Group reconvene to review the committee’s November 1992 HACCP document and compare it to current HACCP guidelines
prepared by the Codex Alimentarius Committee on Food Hygiene. As a result of this 1997 committee meeting, HACCP was defined as a systematic approach to the identification, evaluation, and control of food safety hazards based on the follow- ing seven principles:
Principle 1: Conduct a hazard analysis.
Principle 2: Determine the critical control points (CCPs). Principle 3: Establish critical limits.
Principle 4: Establish monitoring procedures. Principle 5: Establish corrective actions. Principle 6: Establish verification procedures.
Principle 7: Establish record-keeping and documentation procedures. The 2005 edition of the FDA Model Food Code is the most recent edition created by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) of the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and the Food Safety and Inspection Service of the U.S. Department of Agri- culture. The FDA Model Food Code is updated every 4 years. It is critical for all food safety management systems, especially your HACCP plan, to have the most cur- rent scientific information. The FDA Model Food Code provides practical, science- based guidance and manageable, enforceable provisions for mitigating risk factors known to cause foodborne illness. This Model Food Code is a reference document for retail food stores, other food establishments at the retail level, and institutions, such as schools, hospitals, nursing homes, child-care centers, and regulatory agencies that ensures food safety in foodservice establishments.