2.1 Management Commitment
Hello everyone,
I’m currently preparing for our upcoming SQF certification audit and I have some questions regarding compliance with the following requirement of the SQF Code:
2.1.1.2 Senior site management shall lead and support a food safety culture within the site that ensures at a minimum:
i. The establishment, documentation, and communication to all relevant staff of food safety objectives and performance measures;
ii. Adequate resources are available to meet food safety objectives;
I’m wondering whether it is better to create a dedicated SOP for this requirement, or to include it within the existing “Management Commitment and Responsibilities” SOP. Also, what exact information should be included in the SOP to meet this requirement?
If anyone has an example SOP or practical guidance, I would greatly appreciate it if you could share it.
Thank you in advance for your help!
Best regards,
Fiorella
Hi Fiorella,
You could integrate to two into one SOP or tackle each separately, whichever work best for you. I prefer to separate the two as I have specific food safety culture development documents.
There is quite a bit of guidance, so your SOPs can be based on requirements of the SQF Food Safety Code, Guidance and your own company’s Policies and Values.
Ensuring there are adequate resources are available to meet food safety objectives can be covered when cascading objectives dwon through management levels to the shop floor.
Tip Sheet 04 - Management Commitment
SQF Food Safety Culture Guidance
A Culture of Food Safety A position paper from GFSI
Kind regards,
Tony
I personally dislike these clauses as an SOP will do very little for your culture so if that's adequate to comply I think they're missing the point.
The point to me is deciding on what measures help as leading or lagging metrics of your culture. I would try if you can to do some culture measurement but there are obvious lagging metrics you can use. The second key part is making sure you communicate what's going on, regularly and not just from QFS in my view. Lastly the resource bit doesn't explicitly say it but if you're not improving your metrics or not hitting the targets you set, is that looked into on why that's the case and resource allocated to get things back on track? It's hard to argue the resource is adequate if you're not achieving your own targets.
Along with the resources Tony has shared, this is also good and, to my mind, a companion piece to the position paper in that the position paper is "what?" and PAS320 is "how".
Developing a Mature Food Safety Culture - PAS 320:2023 | BSI