Is Half Sleeve Clothing allowed in BRC Packaging Audit?

Hi All,

Is Half Sleeve Shirt / Half Sleeve Polo T Shirt without sewn button, without pockets on front is acceptable in BRC Packaging Audit (Issue 5) or we need to have Full Sleeve only? We come under HIGH HYGIENE category.

 

Regards

Rajat Mitra

We used to have short sleeve polo shirts for our packing staff (food contact plastic packaging) but it was pointed out that arm hair could contaminate the product especially with hair being statically attracted. Therefore we changed to long sleeve T shirts which as solved the button issue too.

Hi,

 

we're certified against BRC Packaging Issue 5 (High Hygiene) and our staff gets shirts in form of half sleeves. We've in the past many discussions about that topic with our auditor, but finally we found a solution.

 

In the standard requires under point 6.5 the BRC a risk assessment for protective cloting. Now we've made a risk assessment about this issue and now we've no problems with half sleeve tshirts.
 

Btw: we produce sleeves

We produce cardboard packaging and everyone wears short sleeves. We have never had this questioned by an auditor.

Hi,

 

we're certified against BRC Packaging Issue 5 (High Hygiene) and our staff gets shirts in form of half sleeves. We've in the past many discussions about that topic with our auditor, but finally we found a solution.

 

In the standard requires under point 6.5 the BRC a risk assessment for protective cloting. Now we've made a risk assessment about this issue and now we've no problems with half sleeve tshirts.
 

Btw: we produce sleeves

 

Thanks for your reply.

Will be great help, if you could reply that if these half sleeves shirts are being changed at your premises only or employee wear it at their residence and come to factory.

This will help me to make a risk assessment easier.

 

Thanks in advance.

It depends on your hygiene policy and laundry method. We wash our uniform (using domestic washer & dryer) on site and no-one is allowed to take or wear uniform off site. It is unhygienic to wear the same shirt at home and then wear during working hours. How do you know what potential contamination there is at home - pets (hairs) etc?

In my opinion use of half sleeve shirt in the food specially high risk food manufacturing environment is a serious issue due to the high possibility of product contamination from hair. As an auditor I would issue a non-conformance.

Contrary to some of the above I believe that short sleeved garments are preferable. This is based on published guidance from NICE (UK's National Institute for Health and Care Excellence) which states that health care workers should be bare below the elbow when administering direct patient care. If it is right for hospitals, it cannot be wrong for a packaging manufacturer.

 

There are dozens of papers available to back this up, but I use this link currently  

 

https://www.nice.org...#ftn.footnote_9

 

section 1.1.2.3 is the relevant bit.

 

Don't forget to put this into your protective clothing risk assessment (BRC 6.5.1)

In my opinion use of half sleeve shirt in the food specially high risk food manufacturing environment is a serious issue due to the high possibility of product contamination from hair. As an auditor I would issue a non-conformance.

Thanks for your reply.

Just to get a little bit more clarity. We are not into food manufacturing rather flexible plastic packaging for food and non-food items. The packaging are primary packaging having food contact.

 

Hence does it apply at our end (Full Sleeve) or we can go ahead with half sleeve.

As long as your risk assessment has taken into account the level of risk from contamination of the food contact packaging due to arm hair you can have half sleeve. You would need to check how 'hairy' people's arms are and colour of arm hair and make a decision. based on that.