How does your business cater for farmers and agribusinesses?

More and more farmers are calling us because the retailers are demanding a very high standard of food safety. Retailers now want their traceability to go right back to the source. There is more and more emphasis on the primary producer. So in recent years we have worked with egg producers, mushroom producers, fishermen and farmers, as well as large food processors and retailers.

What services do you offer farm businesses?

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Farmers are very familiar with the Bord Bia quality assurance schemes and they have no bother meeting the Bord Bia standards on their farms but we can advise and help farmers to attain an even higher standard. We would typically go in and risk-assess the farm, identify hazards and identify areas where they can control, setting up a HACCP (hazard analysis and critical control point) system to follow. There are typically lots of avenues of bacterial hazards on farms, for example through animal waste or water contamination.

Farms are becoming bigger and they may have occasional staff coming in

On a farm, we would be advising on cleaning procedures, personal hygiene for farmer and staff, advising on best practice regarding chemicals, pest control and temperature control. Farms are becoming bigger and they may have occasional staff coming in – do they know how to follow the standards on that farm?

Why are the retailers becoming more stringent?

Retailers are making huge demands of food suppliers. They no longer just want a walk-through review of the farm. They want to see everything documented, full traceability, so that if a product had to be pulled from the shelves, they can trace every single item back along the chain.

The fear of litigation is enormous

It’s all to do with reputation and litigation. The fear of litigation is enormous. For the large retailers, the Aldis and the Marks and Spencers, the effect is huge when something goes wrong. They do not want their brand damaged.

What is the next big trend in food safety?

Food security is growing at a huge pace. We are now working with a lot of companies who want us to assess the security of their food suppliers. A large food processor might call us in to assess their supply chain, check to see if there is a risk that their personnel or a disgruntled ex-employee could pose a threat to the security of their supplies or their product.

What has prompted that fear?

We’ve seen some very high profile food security incidents internationally – the melamine baby formula scandal in China, a deliberately contaminated water bottle in New York, the needles in strawberries scandal in Australia that were found to be inserted by an employee. We started working with companies in this area around 2015 and now it accounts for around 20% of all our work.

What’s next on the horizon?

Allergy awareness and allergy labelling of foods will be a huge area. One in 10 people have some allergy or intolerance and you can see when you are out shopping how, for example, a coeliac may struggle to find something at a deli counter to eat for lunch unless the labelling is done.

I think the vegetarian and vegan trends will drive changes

Allergy labelling of food sold on the internet is a very large gap – there is very little information to see when you buy food online. In the future, I think the vegetarian and vegan trends will drive changes. People who select to be vegan will make labelling of food very important.