Step 7: Determine the Critical Control Points
HACCP requires the identification of steps in the process where control is essential for product safety. At these Critical Control Points (CCP' s) control measures need to be rigorously monitored and maintained to ensure that the product never fails to meet the required safety criteria.
The information evaluated by the HACCP team during hazard analysis is the basis for selecting critical control points. The hazard analysis identifies process steps where significant hazards may occur and also preventative strategies to control them. Careful examination of the 'context' of the hazard, in relation to the complete production process, identifies that control at some process steps is more important than at others. This is basis of HACCP in that some, but not all, steps are critical to food safety.
Step 8: Establish Critical Limits
The process of HACCP so far, has led to the identification of steps in the process where control is essential to secure food safety. At each of these CCP's control is needed at all times and an action plan (steps 8-10) is now developed to ensure this. The first stage in this plan is the determination of the parameters that will indicate effective control. These are termed Critical Limits.
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Step 9: Developing Monitoring Systems
Systems that check that the CCP is operating within critical limits are known as monitoring systems and the development of these systems is the next step in the HACCP process.
Monitoring involves a series of observations or measurements that check that the CCP remains under control. It must be remembered that loss of control at a CCP is critical to food safety and the monitoring system must therefore be failsafe. Monitoring should be capable of showing the operator when a deviation from a critical limit has occurred and control has been lost at the CCP.
Step 10: Developing Corrective Actions
The preceding steps have outlined the methodology required to maintain rigorous control of CCP's However, even the best plans can sometimes fail and HACCP requires an extra level of protection: the development of a series of 'crisis management plans' to cope with loss of control at any CCP. These plans are formalised into written procedures termed corrective actions. In simple language they need to address the issue of 'what would you do if things go wrong ?'
Step 11: Verification
Ease verification is seeking to establish the effectiveness of the plan in controlling food safety. Verification takes into account the initial design of the plan, its implementation in practice and effectiveness over time.
There are two key questions to satisfy during verification. There are;
Are the controls and limits within the plan technically valid?
Are the controls within the plan being complied with in practice?
Step 12: Establish Documentation and Record Keeping
This last stage in the HACCP development process must ensure that the record keeping systems in place are adequate to allow the HACCP system to be managed effectively and verified through audit. the HACCP development process itself will generate a body of documentation that should be retained and organised to support the rationale behind the decisions made in the plan.