7 replies to this topic

[Brendon]

Hello to all on this most excellent website. I am production manager for a smallish UK packer for various well known and not so well known food companies; we pack a variety of foodstuffs with almost all of them ending up on supermarket shelves. When I say production manager because we are <50 heads I also am responsible for quality, food safety and technical issues. In some ways it is good as there is a small chain of command in others it’s not so good as I can quickly get up to my neck in doo doo. We have the BRC Food Standard in place since 2004 I think. For most customers it has served us well. But now we have a chance of some new big business in the far east [Japan] and they are insisting on ISO 22000 because they have the system in their group. My question is as the title says how do we extend our BRC system to meet the requirements of ISO 22000? In fact is it possible to extend or fill in the gaps or is it a different enough system that we need to document an ISO 22000 manual from scratch. BRC seems very comprehensive and I cannot imagine we are too far away. Can anyone provide advice esp. anyone who has been down the same road? Looking for clues.



Any help appreciated.



Many thanks,

Brendon

[Erasmo]

My question is as the title says how do we extend our BRC system to meet the requirements of ISO 22000? In fact is it possible to extend or fill in the gaps or is it a different enough system that we need to document an ISO 22000 manual from scratch. BRC seems very comprehensive and I cannot imagine we are too far away. Can anyone provide advice esp. anyone who has been down the same road? Looking for clues.
Any help appreciated.
Many thanks,
Brendon

I think it is not a goos idea to write a different Manual, you can use the same BRC manual and add requirements of the ISO-22000 standard. A food safety manual is not mandatory for ISO-22000. And there is only a few requirements that you have to add (op PRP's (7.5), some issues in the Management Review (5.8), modify you verification planning (7.8), and maybe others).

[Brendon]

I think it is not a goos idea to write a different Manual, you can use the same BRC manual and add requirements of the ISO-22000 standard. A food safety manual is not mandatory for ISO-22000. And there is only a few requirements that you have to add (op PRP's (7.5), some issues in the Management Review (5.8), modify you verification planning (7.8), and maybe others).

Thank you for your prompt and helpful response Erasmo, it really does help me. I notice you are from Mexico, do you supply to the UK / are you a user of the BRC and ISO 22000? Not needing a seperate system gives me comfort, on the subject of extending BRC to close the gaps you have given me 7.5, 5.8 and 7.8 to investigate but I'm still somewhat concerned with the "maybe others" comment. Can you close the gap a little more for me please? Once again thank you for your help so far.

Regards,
Brendon

Edited by Brendon, 07 September 2008 - 10:31 AM.

[GMO]

I'm currently setting up a system to comply with BRC and ISO22000. I am in the process of writing a Food safety and quality manual and a HACCP manual. What I've done is write the FSQ manual along the lines of BRC excluding HACCP (but referencing the manual) and then building in aspects of ISO22000 which apply there and then I'm making sure my HACCP manual applies to both standards too.

[Erasmo]

One of my clients wants to implement the BRC standard and whey they ask me for help. I was really surprised on how the BRC standard is similar with some elements of the 9001 and the 22000 standards. I think you need to check also requirements 8.4.2 and 8.4.3, and review the definition of VALIDATION of the 22000 standard. BRC uses the same definition of the ISO-9000:2005 because it’s “wider” and also applies for validation in quality and design and development. VALIDATION in ISO-22000 it only applies to control measures.

[Brendon]

Thanks GMO and Erasmo, your advice has helped me enough so that I can make a start extending our system for ISO 22000.

Edited by Brendon, 08 September 2008 - 07:50 PM.

[Jo Head]

Hope I'm not too late to help.

There are many similarities between the 2 standards so you don't need another manual- you should have manual for your business which complies with the various standards, not the other way around.
Many of the gaps between BRC v4 and ISO22000 have been filled with BRC v5 (I was on the working group) .
HACCP and communication may require some additional attention in particular.
In order to avoid unnecessary pain in this type of situation, I recommend using a particular electronic quality management system that allows you to associate documents with different standards and facilitates upgrades to the same standard , as well as the plethora of other benefits from general transparency of quality performance management (including : document control, non-conformance management & training linked to system changes).
If you would like more help, please contact me. I'm sure I can help.

[Simon]

Thanks for your input Jo, I will also say thanks for Brendon in case he's not around. I hope you can stick around to help with more topics.



Regards,
Simon