What is HACCP?
HACCP is the foundation of food safety management, required by food law in most countries and built into ISO 22000, FSSC 22000, BRCGS and SQF. It focuses control on the few steps that really matter for safety, instead of relying on end-product testing. The same thinking appears in other risk tools: the hazard analysis is a specialized hazard analysis, and the decision tree resembles a flowchart of control choices.
The 7 HACCP principles
- Hazard analysis: identify hazards at each step and judge their significance.
- Critical control points: use the decision tree to find where control is essential.
- Critical limits: measurable criteria that separate safe from unsafe (temperature, time, pH).
- Monitoring: what is checked, how, how often and by whom.
- Corrective actions: what to do with the product and the process when a limit is missed.
- Verification: how you confirm the plan works (record review, calibration, testing).
- Records: the evidence of monitoring, corrective actions and verification.
HACCP example
The example is a plan for chilled ready-to-eat chicken wraps in seven steps. Pathogens in raw chicken are significant at receiving, but a later step (cooking) eliminates them, so receiving is not a CCP. The decision tree identifies four CCPs: cooking (core temperature of 75 °C or above), cooling (Clostridium perfringens control), packing and labelling (allergen label verification) and chilled storage (5 °C or below, where no later step controls Listeria growth). Recontamination at assembly is controlled by prerequisite programmes.
Setting critical limits
- Base them on science: regulations, guidance (such as the FDA Food Code) or validation studies.
- Make them measurable in real time: temperature, time, pH, water activity, a visual check.
- Use operating limits slightly tighter than the critical limit, to adjust before a deviation.
- Validate that meeting the limit actually controls the hazard.
How to use this HACCP tool
- Describe the product. Enter the product, its description, intended use and consumers, and the HACCP team.
- Draw the flow diagram. Add, rename and reorder the process steps directly on the flow diagram.
- Analyse the hazards. For each step, list B, C, P and allergen hazards and rate likelihood and severity.
- Find the CCPs. Answer the decision tree questions for the significant hazards; CCPs are numbered on the diagram.
- Complete the HACCP plan. For each CCP, set critical limits, monitoring, corrective actions, verification and records.
- Export. Export the flow diagram, hazard analysis and HACCP plan to PDF or Excel.
Frequently asked questions
What is HACCP?
Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Points (HACCP) is a preventive food safety system. It identifies biological, chemical, physical and allergen hazards at each step of a food process, determines the critical control points (CCPs) where control is essential, and sets critical limits, monitoring, corrective actions, verification and records for each CCP. It is defined by the Codex Alimentarius General Principles of Food Hygiene.
What are the 7 principles of HACCP?
1. Conduct a hazard analysis. 2. Determine the critical control points. 3. Establish critical limits. 4. Establish a monitoring system. 5. Establish corrective actions. 6. Establish verification procedures. 7. Establish documentation and record keeping.
What is a critical control point (CCP)?
A CCP is a step at which a control measure is essential to prevent or eliminate a significant food safety hazard, or reduce it to an acceptable level. Cooking, cooling, metal detection and allergen label checks are typical CCPs. Not every step with a hazard is a CCP; many hazards are controlled by prerequisite programmes.
How does the CCP decision tree work?
For each significant hazard, the Codex decision tree asks: Q1 do control measures exist? Q2 is this step designed to eliminate or reduce the hazard to an acceptable level? Q3 could contamination occur or increase to unacceptable levels? Q4 will a later step eliminate or reduce it? A yes to Q2, or yes to Q3 followed by no to Q4, makes the step a CCP. The tool applies the logic and asks only the relevant questions.
What are prerequisite programmes (PRPs)?
PRPs are the basic conditions for safe food: cleaning and sanitation, pest control, personal hygiene, supplier approval, maintenance, training and allergen management. Hazards adequately controlled by PRPs are not significant hazards for the HACCP plan.
What are the 5 preliminary steps?
Before the 7 principles: assemble the HACCP team, describe the product, identify the intended use and consumers, construct a flow diagram, and confirm the flow diagram on site.