Food safety

How it is used

The central idea of the whole industry. You hear it in job titles (food safety manager), systems (food safety management system), training, audits and law. People say a product 'poses a food safety risk' or that something is 'a food safety issue, not a quality issue'.

Example sentences

1. Every new employee completes a food safety course before starting on the line.

2. The complaint about undercooked chicken is a food safety issue, not just a quality problem.

Common collocations

• food safety management system
• food safety culture
• food safety team
• food safety risk
• ensure food safety

Related terms

• HACCPHazard Analysis and Critical Control Points: a preventive system that identifies food safety hazards and controls them at specific steps of production, based on seven principles.
• hazard analysisThe first HACCP step, in which a team lists the biological, chemical, physical and allergen hazards at each process step and judges how likely and how severe each one is.
• hygieneThe conditions and practices, such as cleaning, handwashing and protective clothing, that prevent food from being contaminated by people, equipment or the environment.
• contaminationThe presence or entry of something harmful or unwanted in food, such as microorganisms, chemicals, allergens or pieces of glass, metal or plastic.
• foodborne illnessAny illness caused by eating or drinking food or water contaminated with harmful microorganisms, their toxins, chemicals or parasites.

More terms: Food Safety and HACCP

• allergen
• critical control point
• cross-contamination
• sanitation
• critical limit
• corrective action
• monitor
• foreign body
• pest control
• prerequisite program