Foqus Quality & Safety – short overview
FrieslandCampina safeguards food safety and food quality with Foqus Food Safety & Quality (FS&Q), a broad-based quality system that assures the operations both at the member dairy farms and at FrieslandCampina’s production and distribution facilities (‘from grass to glass’). Foqus is based on national and international legislation and Codex standards and takes into account the expectations of customers, consumers and social organisations. Foqus Food Safety & Quality is FrieslandCampina guideline in the development of an increasingly robust production process. A basic condition of Foqus is that all facilities must have an externally audited quality certification that complies with the standard of the Global Food Safety Initiative (GFSI). This means that all the companies have an independently evaluated HACCP system – the basis for the production of safe food.
Foqus FS&Q also includes the following components:
- Goal-based regulations with a clear division of responsibilities, for example for change management and crisis management;
- Means-based regulations with clear and detailed requirements, for example for microbiology and hygiene;
- An extensive audit list based on the Deming improvement circle (Plan, Do, Check, Act);
- Guidelines and best practices.
Audits
The operating companies use the audit standard to evaluate their production facilities themselves. The standard is also used by the internal audit team that visits and assesses all production facilities. Every facility is visited on average once every two years, the exact frequency depends on the quality status of the facility concerned. In 2013 29 production facilities were visited to check that the improvement programmes had actually been implemented. Based on these audits goals were set for each business unit This system ensures continuous improvement.
FrieslandCampina has deliberately opted for an internal audit team: the auditors come from various disciplines (QA, plant management, operations) and carry out their audit task in addition to their other duties. This approach results in more thorough audits with the consequence that the auditors acquire knowledge they can apply and disseminate in their own working environment. Auditors and QA officers follow an extensive training programme followed by regular refresher courses.
Foqus Environment, Health & Safety and Fire Prevention
Every FrieslandCampina production facility uses an environment and health & safety management system that complies with the specifications of ISO 14001 and OHSAS 18001. FrieslandCampina has developed its own internal standard for this purpose: the Foqus SHE management system. A standardised risk analysis maps all the environmental and health & safety risks at all the facilities. All the facilities report their environmental and health & safety results each year. The environmental and health & safety management system is safeguarded by means of internal and external audits. All FrieslandCampina companies are ISO 14001 and OHSAS 18001 certificated or have a declaration confirming that the environmental management system complies with the stipulations of ISO 14001.
