Employee Food Safety Handbook

The Food Safety Handbook: A Practical Guide for Building a Robust Food Safety Management System, contains detailed information on food safety systems and what large and small food industry companies can do to establish, maintain, and enhance food safety in their operations. This new edition updates the guidelines and regulations since the previous 2016 edition, drawing on best practices and the knowledge IFC has gained in supporting food business operators around the world. The Food Safety Handbook is indispensable for all food business operators -- anywhere along the food production and processing value chain -- who want to develop a new food safety system or strengthen an existing one.

As with the beginning of the twentieth century, when food safety standards and the therapeutic benefits of certain foods and supplements first caught the public’s attention, the dawn of the twenty-first century finds a great social priority placed on the science of food safety. Ronald Schmidt and Gary Rodrick’s Food Safety Handbook provides a single, comprehensive reference on all major food safety issues. This expansive volume covers current United States and international regulatory information, food safety in biotechnology, myriad food hazards, food safety surveillance, and risk prevention. Approaching food safety from retail, commercial, and institutional angles, this authoritative resource analyzes every step of the food production process, from processing and packaging to handling and distribution. The Handbook categorizes and defines real and perceived safety issues surrounding food, providing scientifically non-biased perspectives on issues for professional and general readers. Each part is divided into chapters, which are then organized into the following structure: Introduction and Definition of Issues; Background and Historical Significance; Scientific Basis and Implications; Regulatory, Industrial, and International Implications; and Current and Future Implications. Topics covered include: Risk assessment and epidemiology Biological, chemical, and physical hazards Control systems and intervention strategies for reducing risk or preventing food hazards, such as Hazard Analysis Critical Control Point (HACCP) Diet, health, and safety issues, with emphasis on food fortification, dietary supplements, and functional foods Worldwide food safety issues, including European Union perspectives on genetic modification Food and beverage processors, manufacturers, transporters, and government regulators will find the Food Safety Handbook to be the premier reference in its field.

Food safety awareness is at an all time high, new and emerging threats to the food supply are being recognized, and consumers are eating more and more meals prepared outside of the home. Accordingly, retail and foodservice establishments, as well as food producers at all levels of the food production chain, have a growing responsibility to ensure that proper food safety and sanitation practices are followed, thereby, safeguarding the health of their guests and customers. Achieving food safety success in this changing environment requires going beyond traditional training, testing, and inspectional approaches to managing risks. It requires a better understanding of organizational culture and the human dimensions of food safety. To improve the food safety performance of a retail or foodservice establishment, an organization with thousands of employees, or a local community, you must change the way people do things. You must change their behavior. In fact, simply put, food safety equals behavior. When viewed from these lenses, one of the most common contributing causes of food borne disease is unsafe behavior (such as improper hand washing, cross-contamination, or undercooking food). Thus, to improve food safety, we need to better integrate food science with behavioral science and use a systems-based approach to managing food safety risk. The importance of organizational culture, human behavior, and systems thinking is well documented in the occupational safety and health fields. However, significant contributions to the scientific literature on these topics are noticeably absent in the field of food safety.