Safe Food Handling

Gives information on how food becomes contaminated and on the measures that should be taken to avoid such contamination, and gives guidance on how to plan and implement a training program for food handlers that will encourage a responsible and conscientious approach to food preparation. Intended for use by managers and supervisors in the food service industry.

How safe is our food supply? Each year the media report what appears to be growing concern related to illness caused by the food consumed by Americans. These food borne illnesses are caused by pathogenic microorganisms, pesticide residues, and food additives. Recent actions taken at the federal, state, and local levels in response to the increase in reported incidences of food borne illnesses point to the need to evaluate the food safety system in the United States. This book assesses the effectiveness of the current food safety system and provides recommendations on changes needed to ensure an effective science-based food safety system. Ensuring Safe Food discusses such important issues as: What are the primary hazards associated with the food supply? What gaps exist in the current system for ensuring a safe food supply? What effects do trends in food consumption have on food safety? What is the impact of food preparation and handling practices in the home, in food services, or in production operations on the risk of food borne illnesses? What organizational changes in responsibility or oversight could be made to increase the effectiveness of the food safety system in the United States? Current concerns associated with microbiological, chemical, and physical hazards in the food supply are discussed. The book also considers how changes in technology and food processing might introduce new risks. Recommendations are made on steps for developing a coordinated, unified system for food safety. The book also highlights areas that need additional study. Ensuring Safe Food will be important for policymakers, food trade professionals, food producers, food processors, food researchers, public health professionals, and consumers.

This book helps in Achieving food safety success which requires going beyond traditional training, testing, and inspectional approaches to managing risks. It requires a better understanding of the human dimensions of food safety. In the field of food safety today, much is documented about specific microbes, time/temperature processes, post-process contamination, and HACCP–things often called the hard sciences. There is not much published or discussed related to human behavior–often referred to as the “soft stuff.” However, looking at foodborne disease trends over the past few decades and published regulatory out-of-compliance rates of food safety risk factors, it’s clear that the soft stuff is still the hard stuff. Despite the fact that thousands of employees have been trained in food safety around the world, millions have been spent globally on food safety research, and countless inspections and tests have been performed at home and abroad, food safety remains a significant public health challenge. Why is that? Because to improve food safety, we must realize that it’s more than just food science; it’s the behavioral sciences, too. In fact, simply put, food safety equals behavior. This is the fundamental principle of this book. If you are trying to improve the food safety performance of a retail or food service establishment, an organization with thousands of employees, or a local community, what you are really trying to do is change people’s behavior. The ability to influence human behavior is well documented in the behavioral and social sciences. However, significant contributions to the scientific literature in the field of food safety are noticeably absent. This book will help advance the science by being the first significant collection of 50 proven behavioral science techniques, and be the first to show how these techniques can be applied to enhance employee compliance with desired food safety behaviors and make food safety the social norm in any organization.

Animal products are vital components of the diets and livelihoods of people across sub-Saharan Africa. They are frequently traded in local, unregulated markets and this can pose significant health risks. This volume presents an accessible overview of these issues in the context of food safety, zoonoses and public health, while at the same time maintaining fair and equitable livelihoods for poorer people across the continent. The book includes a review of the key issues and 25 case studies of the meat, milk, egg and fish food sectors drawn from a wide range of countries in East, West and Southern Africa, as part of the "Safe Food, Fair Food" project. It describes a realistic analysis of food safety risk by developing a methodology of ‘participatory food safety risk assessment’, involving small-scale producers and consumers in the process of data collection in a data-poor environment often found in developing countries. This approach aims to ensure market access for poor producers, while adopting a realistic and pragmatic strategy for reducing the risk of food-borne diseases for consumers.

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.

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.

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