Guidelines for trainers

a. Introduction

Trainers stress the importance of implementing safety assurance programs addressed both to the internal and export markets.

A detailed explanation will follow on the component parts and on the application of fresh fruits and vegetables safety assurance programs, including:

• Prerequisite programs: Good Agricultural Practices, Good Manufacturing Practices, Good Hygiene Practices, and supporting programs such as Standard Operating Procedure and training programs.
• The Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Points system.

Reference reading Material 4.5 and Presentations 4.3, 4.4, 4.5, 4.6 and 4.7 will assist trainers to develop the theoretical foundations.

b. Practical considerations

Participants assemble in teams of no more than 5 persons each, to have enough time to complete the practical exercises.

Part 1. Planning activities

1. The trainer invites each group to choose a particular crop in which the group is experienced, both in production and post-harvest handling.



2. Each team goes through steps 1 to 5 of the HACCP system. Time permitting, each group includes field and packaging procedures. If not, some teams cover production and others post-harvest operations. (Worksheets Material 4.6).



3. Each team makes a brief presentation, in less than 5 minutes, of the results of item 2 (above).

Part 2. Hazard analysis and identifying control points

Teams will:

4. Identify hazards associated to activities described in the flow diagram.



5. Identify methods of control for each hazard (including hazard prevention, reduction and elimination methods should the hazard be present).



6. Establish critical control points (if any) or control points relevant for prevention. Prioritize, for each control point, control methods to be implemented.



7. Establish for each control point or for each critical control point, levels of acceptance..



8. Establish corrective measures.



9. Each team presents their results.

The trainer concludes, pointing out the importance of the HACCP approach for safety assurance programs of fresh fruits and vegetables, using the case study handed out: Presentation 4.8. and Material 4.7. to assist participants. Reference Material 4.8 helps trainers in developing the case study.

Questions allow the trainers to evaluate understanding of Part 2.

Required materials

• overheads and dry pens
• worksheets
• data show
• overhead projector

Expected result

Strengthened aptitudes for hazard analysis and for identifying control measures for hazards detected.

Programs for safety assurance of fresh fruits and vegetables

Background Information

No matter where food is produced, consumers expect it to be wholesome. Very few people are responsible for foods produced by themselves and consumers must, therefore, put their trust in producers, distributors, processors and regulators for the safety of foods consumed.

Expected increases in trade of foods in a globalized world as a result of higher incomes, improvements in transport and distribution systems and a growing population demanding nutritious and safe foods, imply:

• new risks of introducing contaminated foods;
• reintroducing previously controlled risks or hazards;
• contaminated foods may result in the spread of diseases worldwide.

Each country has its own health priorities and concerns. Consumers' perception on food safety risks changes and is influenced by previous experiences with diseases resulting from contaminated products, information on hazards and other related topics. Some societies would regard diarrhoea-causing diseases as normal and naturally occurring and resulting from new teeth in children, eating very spicy foods, indigestion and even superstition, instead of as symptoms of food-borne diseases resulting from the food or its handling. (Buzby, 2001).

Strategies to assure quality and safety rely on guaranteeing and certifying, with processing and production standards, the attributes produce must conform to. This entails verifying that the standards' provisions are met and conformance made apparent through marks, labels or certifications.

Public and private strategies addressing risk of contamination and their controls may differ from country to country. Public strategies usually direct institutional efforts and regulations to both locally produced and imported foods. For fruits and vegetables, National Codex Committees strive to align national regulations with Codex recommended codes of practice. These codes rely on implementing GAPs, GHPs and GMPs to prevent and control contamination hazards in primary production and post-harvest handling by using the hazard analysis approach.

The objectives of safety assurance programs are to:

• protect local consumers assuring the safety of fruits and vegetables produced and traded;
• enhance confidence of foreign markets on safety of locally produced products;
• assure the acceptance in target markets of the exporters' national programs and/or protocols;
• increase the offer of safe foods;
• differentiate between private companies assuring safety of their offers.

These objectives apply nationally, regionally, locally, for a group of producers/exporters or at the company level (farm, trading company, service company, etc.) and result in programs, national/local projects, action plans and projects that meet specific company needs for a product or group of products. Implementing quality assurance programs means:

• knowing the hazards, and their causes, associated to production and post-harvest handling of produce;
• understanding that safety assurance is a shared responsibility under the chain approach.

Safety hazards for fresh fruits and vegetables

The production chain for fresh fruits and vegetables has several links: production, harvesting, post-harvest treatments, packaging, transport and storage, each with its own contamination hazards and, depending on size of operations, of production and of processing systems in use. Safety assurance programs identify these hazards throughout the entire produce production and handling chain.

Three different types of hazards can be associated to product safety: biological, chemical and physical (Presentation 4.3).For further information on hazards associated to fresh fruits and vegetables visit: Improving safety and quality of fresh fruits and vegetables: a training manual for trainers. University of Maryland (2002) at the following link http://www.jifsan.umd.edu/gaps.html, or see the complete document listed on the references to this Manual.

Different methods or practices allow for the dissemination of hazards in the production and handling stages.

Primary production and harvest

• The environment as contaminant.
• Agricultural inputs (water, soil, organic and chemical fertilizers, etc.).
• Inadequate handling of agrosupplements (mixtures, storage, dosage, etc.).
• People and animals.
• Inappropriate facilities.
• Contaminated tools.
• Production methods, crop-seed quality protection methods, planting distances, fertilizing, irrigation, pests and disease controls, shrub management, etc.

Post-harvest handling

• Inadequate facilities.
• Unsuitable packaging.
• Inadequate/contaminated equipment (storage rooms, grading equipment, etc.).
• People and animals.
• Inputs for post-harvesting (washing water, waxes, etc.).

Programs for quality assurance of fresh fruits and vegetables

Programs for quality assurance of fresh fruits and vegetables concentrate in identifying hazards, prioritizing their importance according to the risks represented for produce safety and identifying appropriate prevention and control practices.

1. Prerequisite programs

Include Good Agricultural Practices, Good Manufacturing Practices and Good Hygienic Practices. These are the backbone for quality assurance and safety programs.

Good Agricultural Practices

Include practices improving conventional production and produce handling methods - starting from the selection of the soil to be cultivated - and activities related to production and handling of produce in the field, always stressing SAFETY. Practices also aim at reducing negative impacts of production systems on the environment, fauna, flora and workers' health. GAP in primary production, relies on hazard identification and detection of appropriate prevention and control practices. Specifically for a farm or a production system, Best Practices should be identified within the Good Practice options as those more suitable for production conditions and the environment in the area and in the farm (Presentation 4.4.)

Applying GAP supposes identifying different production hazards, selection of recommended practices avoiding produce contamination, protecting the environment and workers' health. Applying GAP relies on the previous implementation of Integrated Crop Management (ICM) and Integrated Pest Management (IPM) programs, pointing to practices producing economically and viable foods, not affecting natural resources (NRI, 2003). Main components for these systems are:

• applying soil conservation and minimum tillage techniques;
• using self-fixing Nitrogen plants, green fertilizers and soil agro-forestry conservation techniques;
• integrated pests and diseases control methods (involving cultural, physical, chemical and biological controls);
• crop rotation;
• productive use of plants and animals waste;
• preserving biodiversity;
• minimum use of external inputs and non-renewable energy resources.

To enforce ICM and IPM programs, practical research on pests and diseases biological cycles, infestation levels, propagation ways, economic damage thresholds, most appropriate and effective control practices, etc., is required.

Further information on GAP may be found at: Improving safety and quality of fresh fruits and vegetables: manual for train the trainers. FAO/University of Maryland.

Good Manufacturing Practices:

Include practices preventing and controlling post-harvest hazards affecting produce safety and having minimum effect on workers and the environment (Presentation 4.5)

From the chain standpoint, hazard prevention and control in stages previous to production and harvest of produce using GAP are essential to assure success of implementing Good Manufacturing Practices programs. The objective is to ensure that safe raw materials go into the packaging plants with assured safety resulting from using Best Practices in post-harvest handling. Enforcing GMP programs supposes identifying associated hazards in post-harvest handling and suitable preventive and control practices.

Further information can be found at: Improving safety and quality of fresh fruits and vegetables: manual for training the trainers. FAO/University of Maryland.

Good Hygienic Practices

Include all those measures and conditions required to prevent and control produce contamination hazards, mainly biological. In practical terms, the implementation of GAP and GMP (at primary and post-harvest stages) already include all recommendations regarding hygiene practices to produce and handle safe products. (Reference reading: Code of Hygienic Practices for Fresh Fruits and Vegetables).

Good Practices as programs for safety assurance of fresh fruits and vegetables

Good Practices, as seen from safety assurance programs for fresh fruits and vegetables imply:

• knowing the product's potential contamination hazards in production and handling;
• prioritizing these dangers (define risk);
• determining prevention and control procedures for each operation (implementing GAP and GMP), for identified and prioritized hazards;
• applying support procedures, standardized sanitary operating procedures (SSOP) and product recall procedures;
• traceability: consumers tracking and information procedures;
• continuous training to different chain players;
• keeping a record and documentation system.

Standard operating procedures (SOPs)

A written, detailed and accessible description for use by personnel explains how each operation in the flow diagram is performed, including cleaning and maintenance procedures. All are known as SOPs.

Operating programs for sanitation and maintenance are put in place to assure that maintenance and sanitation (cleaning) of facilities, tools and equipment, as well as pests' control and waste handling, are efficiently and appropriately done (Presentation 4.6.). These programs include:

a) Procedures and methods for cleaning and disinfection: Cleaning, hygiene and disinfection programs, should be designed considering existing facilities where product production and adaptation is completed, as well as sanitation facilities, offices, equipment, tools, etc., are available. Cleaning programs must include name of responsible person, working schedules, chemicals and concentrations used for cleaning (equipment and facilities), temperature requirements, cleaning and sanitizing procedures, etc.

Non-contaminating products and chemically and microbiologically acceptable water, properly used, must be employed.

b) Pests' control: Pests are a serious threat affecting safety and life of foods and result in quality losses and increasing chances of food-borne diseases. Programs precluding access, infestation and monitoring for their appearance and eradication are necessary preventive measures.

c) Waste handling or management: Appropriate measures should be taken to remove and store waste and trash produced; these should be absent from areas where fruits and vegetables are handled and stored or from working zones and outlying areas.

d) Monitoring: Procedures checking the efficiency of the maintenance-sanitizing systems should be applied and sampling of outlying areas; areas in contact with produce should be implemented and examined regularly to reflect possible changing conditions.

For further information on these procedures see: Recommended International Code of Practice-General Principles of Food Hygiene: CAC/RCP 1-1969, Rev.3 (1997). For practical examples, see SOP Manual for Melons.

e) Recall procedures: Efficient procedures should be used, allowing for the complete and fast recall from the market of fruits and vegetables showing safety hazards. Until a decision is taken, recalled products should be kept under surveillance to be either destroyed, not used for human consumption or declared safe. See: Recommended International Code of Practice-General Principles of Foods Hygiene: CAC/RCP 1-1969, Rev.3 (1997).

f) Training: To assure the proper implementation of preventive and control measures for identified hazards, the commitment of personnel involved in the process is required as they are responsible for compliance. Success highly depends on the understanding by each of the players in the chain of specifics of food safety and their role in its maintenance. Therefore, training programs aimed at enhancing awareness of the proper application of practices along the processes, are essential and should encompass all actors playing a direct role in production (producers, packing and transport personnel, etc.) and those supporting the chain (technicians, extension workers, researchers, etc.).

Training programs must be periodically updated to ensure that all players are aware of all procedures to maintain safety of fresh fruits and vegetables. It is therefore necessary to articulate efforts between research institutions and the private sector (producers, packing and transport personnel, etc.) to ensure that all are aware of advances in product safety. See: Recommended International Code of Practice-General Principles of Food Hygiene: CAC/RCP 1-1969, Rev.3 (1997).

Traceability: consumers's tracking and information procedures Traceability is the capacity to identify a product origin: where it was produced, inputs received, tracking post-harvest handling, and through appropriate records, following it along the supply chain. These records must be kept for some time (two years) as proof of its history. In quality and safety assurance programs, traceability allows proving conformance to specific standards.

Traceability, more than just being a label identifying production, origin and price, is a system promoting customer confidence and useful to settle quality and safety disputes (Opara, L.U. Mazaud, F. 2001).

To allow for efficiency, traceability schemes rely on an adequate coordination of the many actors in the production and post-harvest handling chain. Proper information must flow easily from link to link, enabling the adoption of actions resulting in safe handling and storage. Consumers should also have this information available to ensure maintaining the required hygienic and use aptitudes.

Personnel hygiene

This is covered by Recommended International Code of Practice-General Principles of Foods Hygiene: CAC/RCP 1-1969, Rev.3 (1997) and in the Code of Hygiene for Fresh Fruits and Vegetables. Personnel may become a safety risk for fresh fruits and vegetables if they have inadequate personal cleanliness, if they suffer from or carry diseases or have an inadequate personal behavior. Training programs and other measures to avoid contact between produce and personnel representing a safety risk must be enforced. Strategies to improve personal cleanliness (protective clothing, hand washing) and practices promoting adequate behavior at work forbidding eating, smoking or spitting should also be adopted to safeguard safety. These strategies and procedures are usually covered in the general hygiene protocols available in the company/plant (See: SOP Manual for Melons).

Hazards Analysis and Critical Control Points System (HACCP)

What is it? Is a control and systematic recording methodology, originating at the USA food processing company Pillsbury and in the North American Space Administration (NASA) to prevent food contamination in space flights and to avoid the effects of astronauts suffering food poisoning in a space mission. With time, the system evolved into a useful tool for the food processing industry, substituting the old-fashioned quality control systems relying on end product inspection and testing and destroying defective products; for quality assurance procedures where processing and production is adjusted along the way to avoid defective products by anticipation and adoption of prevention and control measures. HACCP performs a detailed analysis of the whole production system to identify physical, chemical and biological hazards and those points where control measures should be applied to minimize or reduce risks to acceptable levels. Steps taken to minimize risks should be properly registered and kept as proof of actions adopted.

Advantages. HACCP is applied to food safety management and uses a methodology to identify and control critical points in food handling, to prevent safety problems. It is science-based and applies a systematic approach, identifying specific hazards and measures for their control to ensure food safety.

Foundations of HACCP. HACCP is based on hazard analysis, a series of logical steps to identify and provide answers to potential problems. Hazard analysis is the process of data gathering and evaluation on hazards associated to a particular food and of deciding which are significant and should be approached with a safety assurance program. HACCP consists of:

• analysis of potential hazards in production and post-harvest handling;
• identification of the points where the hazard can take place;
• establishment of the critical points for product safety;
• establishment of effective controls to minimize hazards;
• establishment of a system to monitor critical points;
• review of hazards, hazard analysis, critical points and follow-up records.

Hazard analysis can be simple or very complex depending on the safety assurance program enforced. Sometimes safety programs in primary production and post-harvest result in voluminous records supporting the HACCP system. However these programs, depending on the scale of primary operations and the producers' resources, must concentrate in applying good practices backed up only by essential records.

Establishing a HACCP system

The General Code of Hygiene for Foods. Supplement to Volume 1B-1997, has as an annex document "Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Point system (HACCP), guidelines for its application". The document specifies that "Before applying the HACCP system to any sector of the food chain, it should be working according to the Codex General Principles of Hygiene, relevant Codex Codes of Practice and to legislation relating to food safety". Prior to applying the HACCP system, prerequisite programs (GAP, GMP, GHP, training programs, traceability, standardized sanitary programs, etc.) should be in place.

Establishing a HACCP program relies on the application of the seven HACCP principles:

1. Identify the hazards.
2. Establish the critical control points (CCPs).
3. Establish critical limits (CL) for each CCP.
4. Establish a system to monitor control of the CCP.
5. Establish the corrective action to be taken when monitoring indicates that a particular CCP is not under control.
6. Establish procedures for verification to confirm the HACCP system is working effectively.
7. Establish documentation concerning all procedures and records appropriate to these principles and their application.

Applying these seven principles requires the following 12 steps:

Steps 1 to 5 are preliminary to the plan, steps 6 to 8 apply the 7 principles and define the plan and steps 9 to 12 support the implementation.

A detailed description of each step can be found in "A training manual on food hygiene and the Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Point (HACCP) system, FAO, 2002.

Difficulties defining critical control points and critical limits make HACCP not mandatory for the primary sector.

A critical control point as defined in the HACCP system is a phase in the process where an essential control may be applied to prevent or eliminate a hazard or to reduce this hazard to acceptable levels.

In primary production, for instance, it is not possible to establish just one control ensuring hazard elimination. Internationally, mechanisms establishing barriers along the chain to prevent and control were attempted. These controls, or good practices, together with proactive control and record keeping strive to keep out of the food chain hazards such as physical, chemical and biological contaminants.

For fresh fruits and vegetables, it is also difficult to establish an acceptable level for biological contaminants and efforts are directed to have pathogen free fresh foods. Relatively few steps during processing are addressed at reducing or eliminating biological contamination in already contaminated foods; measures aim at preventing hazards as a result of GAP, GMP and GHP in place.

In post-harvesting, some handling procedures may reduce the occurrence of pathogens: cooling temperatures, thermal processing, irradiation and water sanitizing procedures. But, except for irradiation, there is no guarantee of hazard reduction to acceptable levels, or elimination. New technologies, difficult to access for small producers, are currently being tried.

These constraints should be considered by producers contemplating adoption of a HACCP system. They should always remember that hazard reducing actions (biological in particular) are more preventive than established CCPs.

In any case the systematic approach involved in HACCP (steps in logical sequence, hazard analysis and control points) is valuable to apply safety assurance programs for fresh fruits and vegetables. (Presentation 4.7).