Photo: Apple and Pear Australia Ltd / Flickr (CC BY 2.0)

Get your fresh produce testing program into shape, maximise confidence in your food safety risk management and ensure your customer requirements are being met.

Attend the half-day professional development workshop for produce QA managers, trainers, auditors, students of food safety, risk managers and others, being delivered by the Fresh Produce Safety Centre at Melbourne Markets Conference Centre, Epping, on Wednesday 12 October, 10am to 2pm.

Speakers from wholesale, retail, growers and regulatory organisations will update participants on the latest techniques and requirements for testing fresh produce.

The topics covered will include the what, how, where and when of testing in order to:

  • get the most value out of testing
  • understand the strengths, limits and opportunities of testing
  • interpret test results and follow up actions

Brendan Hayes from Coles will speak on what retailers are looking for in supplier testing programs and how the data can be used to build confidence. ‘There is real value in micro and chemical test results that often goes unnoticed,’ said Brendan. ‘Smart suppliers get better value for their testing dollar. If your aim is to produce safe food then you need to consider what you test, how you sample, what you test it for and what you do with the results,’ he stated.

Dr Craig Miller will provide the regulatory expectations of testing.  Following this year’s recalls on pre-pack salads and rockmelon he will focus on managing residue violations, foodborne illness incidents and consumer recalls.

Other speakers include Dr Robert Premier (expert in fresh produce microbial risk management) and Joe Ekman (Technical Director Fresh Produce Group and Chair of FPSC Technical Committee).

A panel session will enable workshop participants to have their say in identifying what they need to improve their testing data and build confidence in their business.