Foreign Bodies in the Supply Chain

Manufacturers and producers need to understand the processes and procedures which need to be put into place in order to reduce the risk of foreign bodies from entering the food supply chain.

The risk of contamination along the supply chain is a serious challenge for food producers, manufacturers and retailers alike. Intertek can help you to reduce the specific risk of foreign bodies or physical contaminates from entering your food supply chain by offering your business a bespoke solution. Physical contamination includes grass, wood, hair, plastic, dead insects, metal fragments or any foreign body which is not an ingredient.

By partnering with Intertek you will benefit from:

The experience of a world-leading food safety certification body with accreditation for globally recognised programmes including GFSI standards
Expert food safety auditors who will work with you to ensure your products are produced, prepared, packaged, distributed and certified to the highest standards of food safety
Global expertise to help you implement a strong supplier audit programme to ensure food safety is managed along your entire supply chain

Chemical Contamination in Food

Food Microbiological Testing

Our expert auditors can provide customised audits to help you trouble shoot and verify your processes and procedures against the specific risk of foreign bodies from entering the supply chain. We can provide a tailored, in-depth evaluation to assist with foreign body control in your supplier approval process, raw material risk assessment, process risk assessment and management of pre-requisite programmes (PRPs) and also complaint management and root cause analysis.

We can provide a training programme for your staff specifically targeted towards foreign body contamination to help create a food safety culture within your organisation. Our experts can provide two courses aimed at the quality managers, technical managers, production and operations managers, internal audit teams and consultants within your organisation.

The Root Cause Analysis course if for any organisation that wants to move from a ‘fire fighting’ approach to a problem solving/elimination approach and focuses on the theory and practice of Root Cause Analysis (RCA), the various methods for carrying out this procedure and the clauses of the standards that require the effective application of RCA. By the end of the course, attendees will be able to define RCA, understand the role and importance of RCA in compliance with the standards, know the different methods used to carry out an RCA and understand how to apply RCA and document it effectively.

Our Risk Assessment course will ensure you understand the principles of risk assessment, the systematic evaluation of hazards and how to assess the likely exposure of a hazard during use or foreseeable use. By the end of the course, attendees will be able to identify where the BRC Standards demand risk assessment, understand what the BRC expects from a thorough risk assessment and be able to choose and use different risk assessment models against common BRC non-conformities.

Our experts can help you to achieve globally recognised food safety standards such as BRCGS and FSSC 22000 and other Global Food Safety Initiative (GFSI)-recognized standards, as well as ISO 22000 which all have the identification of physical contamination hazards as a basic requirement. Intertek can guide you through which standards would most benefit your business as well as through the entire auditing and certification process.

Identifying the risk of foreign bodies from entering the food chain is a key focus for the HACCP (Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Point) standard which helps your business to identify all possible hazards at your facility.

By becoming certified with a GFSI standard which implements HACCP as a basic requirement, you will be able to identify which foreign bodies have the potential to enter the production process and put remedial steps into place in order to reduce this risk.

By assessing your suppliers against your own quality, safety or security requirements, you will bring your entire supply chain to a higher level of reliability. Intertek can provide bespoke second party auditing programmes which will allow you to evaluate your supply chain, to your own specific standards. Our expert auditors can help you to develop and implement internal auditing programmes to improve the safety, quality and efficiency of your entire supply chain.