1-14. GOALS OF HACCP
a. The major goals of HACCP are to reduce (ideally to zero) complaints of
unsanitary practices in food services and incidences of foodborne illnesses.
b. The HACCP seeks to eliminate hazardous conditions by studying the steps in
the food production process, identifying the critical control points, and making
recommendations to eliminate any safety hazards found.
1-15. THE HACCP PROCESS
a. After obtaining the necessary equipment, identify each ingredient in a product
and do a hazard analysis. The hazard must be identified before a control standard is
imposed. Hazard categories are:
(1) Hazard Category I--has been continually identified by food safety experts
from foodborne illness investigation as an agent or cause responsible for foodborne
illness outbreaks.
(2) Hazard Category II--has been shown by food safety experts in
reproducible laboratory studies to be a likely hazard and cause responsible for
foodborne illness outbreaks or has a strong theoretical rationale based on
scientific data.
(3) Hazard Category III--has been proposed in professional journals by some
investigators as a hazard or cause of foodborne outbreaks, but to date lacks any
operational supporting evidence or strong theoretical rationale that it is a hazard or
cause of foodborne illness.
b. Talk to managers and key workers about potentially hazardous food
ingredients and the way they are received, stored, reconstituted or thawed, handled
during preparation, cooked, handled after cooking, held hot, cooled, reheated, and
served.
NOTE:
"Potentially hazardous food" (PHF) means any food that consists in whole or in
part of milk or milk products, eggs, meat, poultry, fish, shellfish, edible
crustacean, or other ingredients to include synthetic ones, in a form capable of
supporting rapid and progressive growth of infectious or toxigenic
microorganisms. (The term does not include clean, whole, uncracked, odor-
free eggs, or foods which have a pH level of 4.6 or below or a water activity
value of 0.85 or less.)
MD0182
1-10