Food incidents can have an impact on human health, undermine consumer confidence in the quality and safety of food and are costly to the company.
All deviations from the normal operations must be reported on a prearranged plan to selected people. Incident may range from a plant inspection by the government to a deviation in a CCP. An incident is defined as: Any event where, based on the information available, there are concerns about actual or suspected threats to the safety or quality of food that could require intervention to protect consumers’ interests.
It is not always possible for plant people to appreciate the enormity of a problem that might occur. The incident may not be a food safety problem; however, if the process continues to worsen, there might be a breakdown of the system that could lead to a food safety incidents.
An effective plan will help ensure compliance with legal requirements; provide a systematic assessment of incidents; manage and control serious incidents; and protect company assets, which include brand reputation.
Reporting of incidents also allows the review committee to have an overall view of how well the operations are functioning, depending on the incident rate.
Incident Reporting in HACCP
