Ensuring Food Safety from Farm to Fork - The Importance of ISO 22000 in Sri Lanka
Food safety doesn’t begin inside a processing plant and end as a product leaves the supermarket. Food products can be exposed to hazards during farming, harvesting, receiving, processing, packaging, storage, transportation, retail, and preparation. Thus, the management of those risks must be coordinated across the food chain. This is especially true for food businesses in Sri Lanka, where regulatory requirements, customer expectations, and international food-safety practices are constantly changing. The food-control system in Sri Lanka is based on the Food Act No. 26 of 1980, under which more than 30 regulations have been gazetted, according to the Food Control Administration Unit of the country. The authority also has the responsibility of controlling domestic food, controlling imports, and issuing certificates of export for food items. In this context, ISO 22000 certification offers a systematic approach to organizations in developing, implementing, maintaining, and continually impr...