HACCP: Ensuring Quality Food Handling

HACCP stands for Hazards Analysis Critical Control Point. It is a management tool in order to protect the supply of food against health hazards. HACCP is recognized by the FAO-WHO and it is the recommended method to avoid and prevent illness due to food contamination.

HACCP was developed by the Pillsbury company in the 1960's as a project for ensuring food safety. The Pillsbury project was conducted to serve the needs of the NASA Space Program. NASA demanded a zero-defect food program for its astronauts in space. So HACCP was born and it is based on a system that seeks to eliminate failure modes in the food handling process. This system also instituted effects analysis in every stage of the food handling process. So what goes wrong in a stage should be analyzed to determine its causes, probable effects, and what should be the corrective actions. The stress of HACCP is in its control stage. Control of hazards is critical from the first stage of the food processing until the production of finished goods.

HACCP is not a zero-defect, non-risk system. This food processing methodology is used to minimize the hazards in handling food supply form the source up to the end process.

Food establishments are required by appropriate food and health agencies to implement HACCP in their food processing operations. This would ensure that the food served to consumers are quality made and free from hazards.