Dar seafood ppp standard

2.2 Development of a primary production and processing standard for seafood

Proposal P265 – Primary Production and Processing Standard for Seafood, was raised by FSANZ in December 2002 under its mandate to develop domestic standards for the primary production and processing of food.

Recently, some State Governments have developed seafood safety schemes to ensure that a ‘boat to plate’ (i.e. paddock to plate) approach to seafood safety was implemented across the seafood supply chain. However, other Governments are not yet at that point, leaving the primary production end of the domestic seafood chain largely unregulated.
The seafood sector is also increasingly aware that food safety issues are vital to the continued growth of the industry, and has developed a national voluntary seafood safety Standard. The industry has also produced a number of guidance documents on food safety across a range of sectors. It is therefore considered an opportune time to move these developments forward nationally to further improve food safety outcomes.
As required by the Ministerial policy guidelines, a Standards Development Committee (SDC) was appointed in September 2002 by the FSANZ Board to assist in the development of the Standard. The SDC contributes a broad spectrum of knowledge and expertise covering industry, government, research and consumers.
Since December 2002, FSANZ, with the assistance of the SDC, has:

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  considered the written submissions received in response to the public consultation on the Initial Assessment Report and the Draft Assessment Report and;
  
  
  
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  conducted face-to-face consultations with stakeholders (see Attachments 4, 5 and 6);
  
  
  
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  undertaken an evaluation of public health risks and identified sectors of the seafood industry that pose a potential high risk to safety;
  
  
  
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  considered current strategies to manage those risks and determined what, if any, residual risks need to be managed;
  
  
  
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  considered options for the management of these residual risks that aim to ensure the safety of seafood;
  
  
  
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  conducted an impact analysis of the options to identify the option that meets the minimum effective regulation requirements that would effectively address public health and safety risks associated with seafood production;
  
  
  
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  recommended a preferred option;
  
  
  
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  considered the implementation of the preferred option; and
  
  
  
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  drafted a proposed Standard consistent with the preferred option.
  

This Report forms the third stage in the process of developing a primary production and processing Standard for seafood. It takes into account the matters raised above and other deliberations of the Seafood SDC. Industry, government, agencies, consumers and other interested parties are invited to comment on these or any other matters relating to the development of a primary production and processing Standard for seafood.