Criteria for evaluating a supplier to determine the level of risk?

Hello!

do anyone have the criteria for evaluating a supplier to determinate the level of risk?

Thank you!!!!

Just a few things to consider , Do they have a HACCP Plan, Have solid HACCP pre-requisites, auditied by a GFSI -HACCP based firm. Are they high risk for Micro issues (pathogens) and risks for allergens . Thats .. basic , you should have the supplier fill out your supplier approval questionnaire to be sure, outside of doing a personal food safety audit yourself.
Jeff

Hello!

do anyone have the criteria for evaluating a supplier to determinate the level of risk?

Thank you!!!!

Hello!

do anyone have the criteria for evaluating a supplier to determinate the level of risk?

Thank you!!!!

Dear JorgeCompres,

Yr post is rather wide scope.

To illustrate part of previous post, it may well depend on whether yr supplier is breeding cattle, growing vegetables, producing hamburgers, running a legislatorily controlled business, etc, etc.

Rgds / Charles.C

Thank you for your answer!

So what do you do if you have an international supplier? Do you have to do the audit on their facilities to be in conformance with the SQF program?

Just a few things to consider , Do they have a HACCP Plan, Have solid HACCP pre-requisites, auditied by a GFSI -HACCP based firm. Are they high risk for Micro issues (pathogens) and risks for allergens . Thats .. basic , you should have the supplier fill out your supplier approval questionnaire to be sure, outside of doing a personal food safety audit yourself.
Jeff

Thank you Charles!

We are applying for the SQF certification. We are a fruit proccesing plant. Most of our suppliers are for ingredients, fruits, packaging materials, etc...

Dear JorgeCompres,

Yr post is rather wide scope.

To illustrate part of previous post, it may well depend on whether yr supplier is breeding cattle, growing vegetables, producing hamburgers, running a legislatorily controlled business, etc, etc.

Rgds / Charles.C

As you know an effective supplier control system must be in place and include a risk assessment of each supplier. Normally this risk assessment should include but not be limited to

• The inherent risk of the ingredient, materials or service supplied
• Volume of ingredient or materials supplied since this impacts on exposure
• The Supplier history and performance in regard to food safety hazards and issues

From this risk assessment a decision can be made on the:

• Method of supplier approval e.g. self assessment questionnaire, supplier audit or certification
• The method of supplier monitoring and degree of monitoring
• Type and frequency of raw material sampling and testing if required

Ensure that you determine the frequency of review for each supplier and again risk assessment can be used to justify your decision. Annually should be the minimum. In regard to a site audit, the risk rating for each supplier can be used to determine the need for audit and the audit frequency.

Dear JorgeCompres,

Not a user of SQF myself (or in fruit business) but the most obvious first step is to consult the downloadable SQF Guidance materials on the website for their minimum requirements (last time I looked was not yet updated for latest versions). Plus have a look at some model haccp plans.

A substantial part of the risk assessment usually tends to be auto-revealed within the hazard analysis.

I would imagine yr raw material is not routinely classified as "High Risk" unless there are specific reasons, eg history / specific material, to be otherwise. (Frankly, in these days of multiple terminologies I'm not entirely sure what "high risk" means any more}.

IMEX the basic (as per George's generic summary) immediate requirements for yr type of system are (textbook) items such as -

(1) Mutually agreed Product Specification covering Wholesomeness and FS aspects (an obligatory requirement IMEX).
(1) Is the supplier certified to a recognised GAP scheme with respect to raw material?
(2) An ISO standard such as 9001 (probably unlikely )
(3) Have you (or 3rd party) carried out a satisfactory audit?.
(4) Satisfactory samples

Ingredients / packaging can be more complicated depending on sourcing.
The basic requirement is clearly an intrinsic / validatable Food Grade compatibility.


Personally (no specific "high risk" inputs), for raw materials, i use an A,B,C,D(fail) ranking system for the supplier and initially grade them equal at B if they satisfy above type of requirements then adjust the ranking based on cumulative Performance Satisfaction (eg average defect/rejection rate) together with corrective actions where appropriate (eg FS critical / major defect). As previous post, frequencies are geared to ranking except for initial trial period where sampling is somewhat elevated for obvious reasons.

However every system has its own peculiarities.

Rgds / Charles.C

Hello!

do anyone have the criteria for evaluating a supplier to determinate the level of risk?

Thank you!!!!

Hi JorgeCompres,

George has posted a summary of risk assessment in which you can take a systematic approach.

Your evaluation should be considering:
- your product
- the material supplied
- what you do with the material supplied
- if your process eliminates any potential hazards (e.g. Filtration/Cooking)
- the supplier performance/history of supply
- severity of the hazard

So if I was looking at a packed processed product with ingredients that are added after processing I might end up with these risk categories (1. High - 4. Low):
1. Unprocessed Ingredient Supplier
2. Processed Ingredient Supplier
3. Primary Packaging Supplier
4. Secondary Packaging Supplier

Regards,

Tony

Thank you!!

As you know an effective supplier control system must be in place and include a risk assessment of each supplier. Normally this risk assessment should include but not be limited to

• The inherent risk of the ingredient, materials or service supplied
• Volume of ingredient or materials supplied since this impacts on exposure
• The Supplier history and performance in regard to food safety hazards and issues

From this risk assessment a decision can be made on the:

• Method of supplier approval e.g. self assessment questionnaire, supplier audit or certification
• The method of supplier monitoring and degree of monitoring
• Type and frequency of raw material sampling and testing if required

Ensure that you determine the frequency of review for each supplier and again risk assessment can be used to justify your decision. Annually should be the minimum. In regard to a site audit, the risk rating for each supplier can be used to determine the need for audit and the audit frequency.

Excelent answers, it really helps, thank you!!

Dear JorgeCompres,

Not a user of SQF myself (or in fruit business) but the most obvious first step is to consult the downloadable SQF Guidance materials on the website for their minimum requirements (last time I looked was not yet updated for latest versions). Plus have a look at some model haccp plans.

A substantial part of the risk assessment usually tends to be auto-revealed within the hazard analysis.

I would imagine yr raw material is not routinely classified as "High Risk" unless there are specific reasons, eg history / specific material, to be otherwise. (Frankly, in these days of multiple terminologies I'm not entirely sure what "high risk" means any more}.

IMEX the basic (as per George's generic summary) immediate requirements for yr type of system are (textbook) items such as -

(1) Mutually agreed Product Specification covering Wholesomeness and FS aspects (an obligatory requirement IMEX).
(1) Is the supplier certified to a recognised GAP scheme with respect to raw material?
(2) An ISO standard such as 9001 (probably unlikely )
(3) Have you (or 3rd party) carried out a satisfactory audit?.
(4) Satisfactory samples

Ingredients / packaging can be more complicated depending on sourcing.
The basic requirement is clearly an intrinsic / validatable Food Grade compatibility.


Personally (no specific "high risk" inputs), for raw materials, i use an A,B,C,D(fail) ranking system for the supplier and initially grade them equal at B if they satisfy above type of requirements then adjust the ranking based on cumulative Performance Satisfaction (eg average defect/rejection rate) together with corrective actions where appropriate (eg FS critical / major defect). As previous post, frequencies are geared to ranking except for initial trial period where sampling is somewhat elevated for obvious reasons.

However every system has its own peculiarities.

Rgds / Charles.C

Hello!

do anyone have the criteria for evaluating a supplier to determinate the level of risk?

Thank you!!!!

There are normally two ways for this evaluation and this is not to be confused with an approved supplier program where you have all sorts of items that you get from your suppliers.

Most companies I work with use a set of questions that are applied to both the supplier and to the product.

And then each item is provided with a grade or score (most I see are 1 to 5).

An example of this might be something like this -

Product arrives at correct temperature, Product damage, packaging damage, Trailer clean, Driver follows GMPs.

The above would be applied to the vendor -

You can take it there for the product.

It's actually interesting that after doing this for just short while how you begin to get a good picture into who are your good suppliers and who supplies you with good product.

Many of our clients rate daily and weekly and do trend analysis.


Glenn Oster