Historial: en12004HACCP

INTRODUCTION

Article 5 of Regulation (EC) No 852/2004 of the European Parliament and of the Council on the hygiene of foodstuffs requires food business operators to put in place, implement and maintain a permanent procedure based on Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Point (HACCP) principles.

HACCP systems are generally considered to be a useful tool for food business operators in order to control hazards that may occur in food. In view of the wide range of food businesses to which Regulation (EC) No 852/2004 is addressed, and in view of the great diversity of food commodities and manufacturing procedures that are applied to food, it seems useful to issue general guidance on the development and implementation of HACCP based procedures.

Regulation (EC) No 852/2004 allows the HACCP based procedures to be implemented with flexibility so as to ensure that they can be applied in all situations. Since the adoption of Regulation the Commission has been requested to clarify to what extent flexibility with regard to the implementation of the procedures based on the HACCP principles can be applied.

This document aims to issue guidance on the requirement laid down in Article 5 of Regulation (EC) No 852/2004, and on the flexibility that can be applied in particular in small businesses.

The Commission’s Health and Consumer Protection Directorate General has held a series of meetings with experts from the Member States in order to examine and reach consensus on these issues.

In addition, and in the interest of transparency, the Commission has promoted discussion with stakeholders so as to allow different socio-economic interests to express an opinion. To this end the Commission has organised a meeting with representatives from producers, industry, commerce and consumers to discuss issues related to the implementation of HACCP based procedures and to HACCP flexibility.

It was considered that this is a useful procedure, which should continue in the light of the experience gained by the full application of the Regulation from 1 January 2006.

The present document aims to assist all players in the food chain to better understand HACCP implementation and HACCP flexibility. However, this document has no formal legal status and in the event of a dispute, ultimate responsibility for the interpretation of the law lies with the Court of Justice.

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