HACCP Based Automated Handwashing for Food Processing Facilities

1. Conduct a Hazard Analysis

Hazard analysis is the first step of any HACCP handwashing plan, it is important to know where potential risks to food products are in your facility. The main hazard related to handwashing and personal hygiene is the risk of an employee or visitor entering the production zone with contaminated hands and touching products, potentially contaminating the product.

7. Establish Record Keeping Procedures

The last, but not least important, step is record-keeping - a complete documentation of the HACCP plan and procedures. The records help you to analyze any possible problem areas and show how well you have been doing at preventing hazards and ensure safe product for your customers.

2. Identify Critical Control Points

The critical control point in a HACCP plan is where the hazard is managed to ensure food safety. For handwashing, this is at the entrances and exits of production areas, where employees and visitors must wash their hands to remove pathogens before entering an area with RTE food.

6. Establish Verification Procedures

Periodically, a review is needed to verify if all established steps in your process are operating according to the plan. This may include a review of the handwashing records, equipment maintenance, or checking that the handwashing procedures have their intended effect. The best way to verify that handwashing is removing the harmful pathogens is by ATP testing. To learn more about how to conduct and analyze an ATP test, visit our downloadable ATP testing guide here.

3. Establish Critical Limits

Critical limits in a HACCP plan is the correct procedure for addressing the hazards in the critical control points. The critical limit for handwashing should be to reduce the amount of harmful pathogens on employee and visitors hands to as close to zero as possible before entering the production area. This is limit is met by having every person entering production conduct a thorough hand wash.

5. Establish Corrective Actions

When a critical control point is being observed not complying with a critical limit, corrective actions must be taken. If proper handwashing procedures have not been observed, the corrective actions could be retraining employees on handwashing processes or educating employees and visitors on the importance of handwashing in supplying customers with safe food products. For facilities with Automated Hygiene equipment, the stations are easy to use making employee training and any necessary corrective actions simple. For additional support with training, download the HACCP-Based Automated Handwashing SOP Resource.

4. Monitor Critical Control Points

Monitoring critical control points is essential in a HACCP handwashing plan to ensure that employees are washing their hands every time they enter and exit production. For a manual sink, designating a staff member to observe that employees and visitors are washing their hands is the best way to monitor the critical control point. CleanTech® EVO Automated Handwashing Stations, have hygiene compliance data that can be accessed to monitor handwashing station use, allowing facilities to not have a designated hand wash monitoring staff member.