Food businesses should take note of the updates made in 2023 to MPI’s food control plan and national programme templates as businesses will need to be using the updated plan by February 2024 and some changes need to be implemented by June 2023.
MPI have revised and published the following documents:
- Simply, Safe & Suitable template Food Control Plan
- Food Notice: Requirements for Food Control Plans and National Programmes;
- Food Notice: Food Service and Food Retail Business Food Control Plan templates issued under section 39.
Some key changes to the plan are:
- changing the pH requirements for acidified rice in the ‘Making sushi’ card
- adding time/temperature requirements for hot smoking seafood
- allowing food businesses to prove their method for cooling freshly cooked food, and reheating food
- expanding the scope of the ‘Using acid to control bugs’ requirements to allow for more than just pickling of meat, fruits and vegetables
- updating the visual description of the 2 hour/4 hour requirement
- adding a visual description of the cooling freshly cooked food requirement
More details on the changes can be found in the summary of submissions from consultation here.
Key dates:
All template Food Control Plan businesses will need to be using this updated plan by 20th February 2024.
However, there are some specific cards that they will need to add to their plan by 30 June 2023:
- Separating food
- Knowing what’s in your food
- Packaging and labelling
- Recalling your food
They will need the below cards if they are relevant to their business:
- Using acid to control bugs
- Making sushi
- Hot smoking to control bugs
- Managing self-supply water