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Update on Food Safety Incidents – what you need to do to assure that your certification is maintained?

Dear customers,

We would like to draw your attention to important requirements regarding food safety incidents, e.g. recalls and withdrawals, how you manage them and report and notify Certima BV about this. Keep in mind that the way you handle food safety incidents has a direct impact on your certificate. Read on to know what you need to do to assure that your certification is maintained.

For Food Safety Incidents including: product recall(s), product recall(s) and / or withdrawal(s) by official order concerning food safety and / or food fraud reasons or any visit from health authorities which resulted in notifications and / or penalties issued by authorities, Certima BV shall be informed within three (3) working days. Recalls on products out of the certified scope (exclusions) shall also be reported as the cause may have a relation with products in the certified scope.

If Certima BV is not informed about a food safety incident (on time), we may need to suspend the certificate until you prove that your FSMS is working efficiently by informing us about incident details (supported with evidences) and how it is handled.

Reporting should be done by e-mail to recall@certima.org. In order to supply consistent information, certified customers need to fill out the “Notification Form Food Safety Incidents including Recall/Withdrawal”. You can find the form on our website: https://certima.org/certima/recall-management/. This form has to be completed and sent to Certima as soon as possible. Furthermore, certified customers are responsible for investigating and subsequently providing the details including the Correction, Corrective Actions and Root Cause Analysis regarding the incident. An Incident manager at Certima shall review the submitted information in the completed form and all additionally provided documents, and evaluate whether the incident has been managed in a satisfactory way and whether the certificate can be maintained. All information will be treated strictly confidential, but it will be reported to the scheme owners as per their strict protocols for reporting of food safety incidents. The information will be reported to the accreditation bodies at their request. Incidents having a major impact on public safety and/or generating a lot of media interest have to be reported to Certima pro-actively.

BRCGS requires from certification bodies to notify BRCGS within 2 working days of receiving the recall information (and other incidents) by completing recall submission form on BRCGS Directory with the product safety incident details received from the site. However, this initial notification should contain basic product, site, and incident details. The remaining information can be added at a later date, once the certification body review is complete. This remaining information should be updated within 3 weeks of the date of recall (i.e. 21 calendar days) by the Certification Body.

With the version 7 of the IFS Food IFS has required the reporting of extraordinary information about certified customers including food safety incidents such as product recalls, product withdrawals by official order concerning food safety and food fraud reasons, or any visit from health authorities which resulted in notifications or penalties issued by authorities, the certification body shall be informed. With IFS Food version 8 the required information is a lot more detailed and strict deadlines will be introduced.

To allow enough time for your preparation to meet the upcoming requirements by IFS, hereby a brief extract from the draft IFS Food v8 about handling and reporting food safety incidents:

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<<<Notifications to the certification body

During the certification cycle, the senior management of the company shall ensure that the certification body is informed in due time about any changes that may affect the company’s ability to conform to the certification requirements (e.g. recall, alert on products, changes in organization and management, important modifications on the products and/or the production methods, changes in contact address and production sites, new address of the production site, etc.). The details shall be defined and agreed between both parties. As required in the IFS Food Audit checklist (Part 2), requirement 1.2.6, some specific situations require a notification to the certification body within three (3) working days.

After receiving such information from the sites (limited to the three (3) specific situations requiring a company notification within three (3) working days), the certification body shall:

• Fill out in English the relevant form provided in the IFS Database and send it back to IFS Management GmbH within three (3) working days after receiving the information from the company.
• Provide to IFS Management GmbH a root cause analysis and progress of the investigation within ten (10) working days (after submitting the form).

It is the certification body’s responsibility to investigate each situation and decide any action on the IFS Certification status.>>>

For more information and audit requests you can contact us at: info@certima.org.

Our team is proud to inform you that Certima BV has become an IFS approved training provider and you can expect our first IFS trainings in Q1 2023.

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An IFS Training Provider is a training center recognized by IFS Management GmbH that provides specific training courses on different topics with the aim to implement and get insights into IFS standards in the food quality and safety field. 

In November 2022 Certima BV has joined the IFS Academy and has been recognized as an IFS Training Provider.

The list of approved training providers can be found here: IFS Database – Training centers (ifs-certification.com)

You can expect our first IFS trainings in Q1 2023.

In response to the situation in Ukraine and the problem of disrupted supply chains, supply bottlenecks for raw materials and the resulting influences on supplier and raw material management as well as on customer specification and recipe management in terms of allergen, GMO and labelling, IFS have issued the following guidance for IFS stakeholders: IFS Database – IFS Blog – Supply chain disruption through Ukraine crisis – Guidance for IFS Stakeholders (ifs-certification.com).

Certified customers should take into account that all necessary changes in products and process management should be comprehensive. This comprehensive documentation and communication must be available during the next IFS Assessment. Documentation of the issues, decisions and measures taken and communication of the changes made in order to maintain production and meet delivery obligations, should be maintained.

Internal Auditor Course (IFS&BRC based)

The essential skills for internal auditing of Food Safety Management System based on IFS and/or BRC;

• coming in Q2 2022, in Dutch.

Lead Auditor Course (IFS&BRC based)

IFS&BRC based 5days Lead Auditor Course – the central stepping stone for a career in food safety auditing;

• coming in Q2 2022, in English.

meld u aan voor onze Certima online conversietraining.

IFS heeft zojuist de publicatie van de nieuwe IFS Food versie 7 aangekondigd. Vanaf 1 maart 2021 kunnen audits volgens de nieuwe versie uitgevoerd worden. De implementatie zal verplicht worden voor alle bedrijven die gecertificeerd worden vanaf 1 juli 2021. Voor de onaangekondigde, multi-site, extension en follow-up audits gelden speciale regels.

Doe mee met onze Certima online conversietraining om uw kennis over de nieuwe auditeisen te vergroten.

Door hier te klikken kunt u zich aanmelden.

Datum             26.03.2021

Duur                 tot 4 uur

Taal                   Nederlands

Trainer             Nederlandse auditoren (IFS Food, IFS Broker, IFS Logistics and BRC Food)

Prijs                   € 185 excl. BTW

Voor meer info: customerservice@certima.org

De inhoud van de training:

• De wijzigingen in IFS Food versie 7:
  • Overzicht van de nieuwe eisen vanuit het perspectief van de auditor.­­­­
  • Wijzigingen in het scoringssysteem.
  • Onaangekondigde audit.
  • Wijzigingen in de regels over de tijdsduur van de audit.
  • Food Safety Culture.
• Meest recente uitleg van de eisen van de IFS Food, gebaseerd op de praktijk van audits en certificering.

IFS heeft haar standpunt ten aanzien van audits op afstand bekend gemaakt. Vanaf heden kunnen broker bedrijven die al IFS Broker gecertificeerd zijn hun voordeel doen middels de optie hun eerstvolgende certificatie audit op afstand te laten uitvoeren.

Wij zijn van mening dat, wanneer het haalbaar is, audits op afstand een toegevoegde waarde hebben voor alle deelnemers in het audit- en certificeringsproces. Het levert meer efficiëntie op voor gecertificeerde bedrijven, het verlaagt de kans op verspreiding van het COVID-19 virus en bovendien draagt het bij aan een gezonde werk-privé balans voor de auditors.

Als u graag wilt profiteren van onze speciale voorwaarden voor uw volgende IFS Broker audit op afstand kunt u contact met ons opnemen: m.genkova@certima.org.

∞ ∞ ∞

Informatie en Communicatie Technologie ( ICT) vergroot de haalbaarheid van audits op afstand.

Om te voorzien in volledige begeleiding bij de werkwijze van een audit op afstand heeft IFS Management een aanvullend protocol geschreven. Hierin staat hoe een IFS Broker audit op afstand vormgegeven kan worden om verzekerd te zijn van een degelijk audit proces door op afstand ICT voor de evaluatie van IFS Broker versie 3 toe te passen.

De mogelijkheid om een audit op afstand te laten uitvoeren is vrijwillig en zal van tevoren goedkeuring nodig hebben van zowel de certificatie-instelling als het bedrijf wat een IFS Broker certificering wenst te ontvangen. Bijvoorbeeld wat te doen als een op locatie geplande IFS audit niet plaats kan vinden vanwege reis- of toegangsbeperkingen vanwege Corona virus ( SARS-CoV-2). Een ander voorbeeld: de broker heeft een gedecentraliseerde werksituatie en werkt zonder een centraal kantoor ( “co-working” ruimtes, verschillende werkplekken). Ook als “face-to-face” methodes niet nodig zijn voor de effectiviteit van het uitvoeren van een audit zal gezamenlijke afstemming nodig zijn.

In aanloop naar de voorbereiding van een audit en als een voorwaarde vooraf, zal de certificatie-instelling een risico inschatting maken om te onderzoeken of het haalbaar is om een audit op afstand uit te voeren.

De volgende factoren zullen in overweging genomen worden, maar zijn niet beperkt tot:

• Adequate medewerking van de geauditeerde ( bijv. toegang tot een IT systeem, beschikbaarheid en capaciteit van de geauditeerde om de technologie zoals ICT op afstand te kunnen gebruiken)
• Middelen inclusief toegang tot een voldoende werkzame, adequate en geschikte ICT, inclusief IT ondersteuning voor het ICT platform indien nodig
• De beperking van de welwillendheid van medewerkers om informatie op afstand te delen.

Source: IFS Management GbmH

A number of important changes are coming with new version 7 of IFS Food.

Few of them are:

• Additional requirements added for Food safety culture;
• Outsourced processes, unannounced audits, multi-legal entitites;
• Changes structure of the standard
• More time of audit time dedicated to production/onsite evaluation
• Change in the scoring system
• More specific requirements to corrections and corrective actions and their closing

More information about the changes in IFS Food ver.7 you would learn if you join our dedicated events. The first one will be this autumn in the Netherlands. Stay tuned to hear about our events in your region.

To register, please send an email at: m.genkova@certima.org

 

If you are exporting food to the U.S. and want to assure that your exports continue uninterruptedly you need to implement FSMA requirements into your Food Safety Management System.

Why it’s important to attend a PCQI course?

The FSMA regulation requires that certain activities must be implemented by a “Preventive Controls Qualified Individual” (PCQI) who has “successfully completed training in the development and application of risk-based preventive controls”.

The paved way to gain knowledge, understanding and skills for implementing FSMA requirements is to attend a PCQI course. The participants receive a certification of completion as Preventive Controls Qualified Individuals (PCQI). Our courses are delivered by FSPCA qualified trainers in several languages and locations throughout Europe.

REGISTER NOW for our upcoming PCQI training coures:

• ONLINE In German language with our trainer Angelie Jansen – 25-28 May 2020

To register, please send an email at m.genkova@certima.org