The on-farm food safety certification program for Canada’s fruit and vegetable growers will offer two new options for farm certification next month, plus a third approved agency to handle certification audits.
The Canadian Horticultural Council’s CanadaGAP program, which previously offered growers three certification options (A, B or C), will subdivide Option “A” into three options as of April 1, giving eligible growers the chance to save on audit costs.
In Option A1 (formerly known as Option A), a grower must successfully complete a full on-site audit in his or her first year in CanadaGAP, and submits self-assessments to his or her certification body in each of the three years following.
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Farms following Option A1 are also chosen at random for on-site audits in the second, third and fourth years of a four-year certification, but still must submit to a scheduled audit every four years, regardless of whether a farm has been randomly audited in the meantime.
In Option A2, however, if a CanadaGAP participant is picked for a random audit, the date for his or her scheduled audit is then extended to four years away from the date of that random audit.
In Option A3, meanwhile, a group of producers can be certified by organizing and running their own on-farm food safety management system. The group’s internal audits must cover all group members’ farms over a four-year period, and all certified group members must submit their self-assessments each year in between audits. Also, a CanadaGAP certification body must audit the group’s management system every three years, including sampling of central sites and internally audited members.
The new certification options “were created at the request of some customers in the domestic market,” the horticultural council said in a release Wednesday.
Third certifier
The horticultural council on Tuesday also announced it has added the Guelph Food Technology Centre (GFTC) as its third certification body, responsible for oversight and delivery of CanadaGAP audits of certified operators.
As a CanadaGAP certification body, the GFTC joins Toronto-based QMI-SAI Global and Gestion Qualiterra, a subcontractor of QMI-SAI based in Longeuil, Que. to handle audits and certifications in Quebec.
“Program participants will now have more choice in selecting their service provider for CanadaGAP certification,” Heather Gale, CanadaGAP’s national program manager, in a release Tuesday.
GFTC already handles food safety audits for companies aiming to meet SQF 1000/2000 or BRC certification standards, among others. The centre said it consults with over 1,500 businesses in the food and beverage industries each year.
