Food Safety Education Month: Recommended Reading for Food Processors & Manufacturers

September is Food Safety Education Month and, as such, we decided to round some of our favorite articles from 2019 related to safe food processing and manufacturing. Food safety education is a year-round priority but there’s nothing wrong with giving it a little extra focus this month. This year, we wanted to focus on food safety culture as it provides a necessary foundation for every kind of food processing or manufacturing facility that aims to produce a safe product for consumers. A positive food safety culture doesn’t happen overnight but there’s never a better time than the present to get to work on it.

Food Safety = Culture Science + Social Science + Food Science

Food Safety Magazine

“Food safety culture works at the intersection of food science, organizational culture, and social cognitive science. We need to understand the interactions between traditional food sciences, including food safety, and the sociocultural sciences to determine what food safety culture is and how it can be measured and improved. Although everybody is talking about it, food safety culture is a relatively new concept for the food industry, and it is useful to look back at food safety assurance developments in recent history to understand our route into food safety culture and why it is so important today.”

https://www.foodsafetymagazine.com/magazine-archive1/aprilmay-2019/food-safety-culture-science-social-science-food-science/

The Importance of Food Safety Culture

Safe Food Alliance

“Most facilities fall somewhere in the middle of the spectrum, balancing the desire for food safety with legitimate concerns about profitability. It is not difficult, however, to identify whether a facility sees a food safety audit as another bureaucratic hurdle or an opportunity for growth. That attitude often acts as an indicator of how the company will perform on their audit. Sites that prioritize safety and continuous improvement are likely to have better audit outcomes.”

https://safefoodalliance.com/management/the-importance-of-food-safety-culture/

Designing Your Hygienic Zoning

Quality Assurance & Food Safety Magazine

“There will be situations and areas where neither a physical barrier nor the ideal traffic flow makes sense, so employee practices and training will be essential. When zone segregation depends on employee practices, the challenge will be ensuring that these are followed diligently, with success often directly related to the food safety culture within the facility.”

https://www.qualityassurancemag.com/article/sanitary-design--hygienic-zoning/

5 Simple and Effective Ways you can Positively Impact Food Safety Culture

Anthony Raschke, LinkedIn

“Food Safety Culture is however not your Food Safety Program and your Food Safety Program does not define the culture. Culture is defined by our people.”

https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/5-simple-effective-ways-you-can-positively-impact-food-raschke/

10 Easy Improvements for a More Sanitary Processing Plant

Manufacturing.net

“Get everyone on the sanitation bandwagon. Include maintenance staff, production workers, office personnel and top management in training and activities to increase their understanding of how crucial sanitation is to their job security. Solicit improvement suggestions from all departments and create ‘clean teams’ to help with food safety audits, inspections or compliance checks.”

https://www.manufacturing.net/article/2019/03/10-easy-improvements-more-sanitary-processing-plant

Imagine Food Safety as Music

Quality Assurance & Food Safety Magazine

“Imagine if food safety efforts were treated like music — something that can be woven into the fabric of industry like an art…like something that drives and is driven by passion. Imagine if solo food safety workers were to collaborate and band together with large groups to orchestrate herculean efforts.”

https://www.qualityassurancemag.com/article/imagine-food-safety-as-music/

Chances are, if you’ve taken the time to check out this post, you know how important food safety culture is. That said, it can be hard to step back and gauge your own culture. For tips on how to do that, check out this this piece we authored for Food Safety Tech.