Does not the IFS 7 define the food safety culture as
Shared values, beliefs and norms that affect mindset and behaviour toward food safety in, across and throughout an organization. Elements of food safety culture are those elements of the food safety management which the senior management of a company may use to drive the food safety culture within the company. These may include, but are not limited to: • Communication about Food Safety policies and responsibilities, • Training, • Employee feedback on food safety related issues, • Performance measurement.
It looks like you have to have food safety culture as part of the policy and as an agenda item during management review.
I think the easiest steps would be determine how will you evaluate food safety culture and what does that look like; a few things come to mind;
1. Is there urgency in all departments when a non-conforming product arises or is just quality?
2. How quickly and promptly are quality issues resolved? Who is involved?
3. Who is involved in GMP audits? Having a diverse GMP audit group from all departments will drive food safety culture (e.g. by training all people to correctly observe a GMP violation and/or something that needs improvement)
4. How quickly are audit findings closed? Do you track overage days vs. completion rate?
5. What is the general feeling about quality in the plant? If it is low then that means more meetings should be held by top management to drive importance through new initiatives (like the ones I mentioned above GMP involvement and Audits).
Edited by jdpaul, 12 January 2021 - 08:55 PM.
