The recent article on the Cannavacciuolo case was the subject of lively comments on our Facebook page. On the one hand there are those – like us – who appreciate the work of the NAS under the banner of legality, and on the other hand there are those who complain that the rules are too onerous on public merchants. The occasion is worth recalling the ABCs on hygiene in restaurants.
A – Professionalism
Running a public establishment today requires a level of professionalism unimaginable until a couple of decades ago. The bureaucratic complexities associated with concessions, permits and taxes are compounded by the typical difficulties of doing business in Italy. From accessing credit to managing payroll, even just running a small coffee shop is not within everyone’s reach.
The sale and serving of food and beverages, in turn, requires the development of a self-sanitation system that is often underestimated. The fateful ‘HACCP plan’ (1) was introduced back in 1997, (2) although for years it was ignored by almost all operators.
HACCP is to this day an almost unknown acronym, remembered only as it stands out in large letters on a piece of paper posted on premises. It should express the concrete analysis of the health risks that each operator may incur-because of the specific characteristics of the facilities and workings-but it is in fact understood as one of many formalities, to be done at minimum cost.
The https://www.greatitalianfoodtrade.it/etichette/controlli-il-ruolo-dellamministrazione-sanitaria/ and NAS are endured with fear or frustration precisely because many practitioners lack knowledge about the basic criteria by which the regulations are inspired. In a nutshell, hygiene and food safety.
B- Food hygiene and safety
The hygiene and sanitation regulations to guard the safety of processes and products in the food chain are now rooted in the so-called Hygiene 1 regulation, which has been in effect for exactly 12 years. (3) This measure, in addition to requiring the registration of each operator with the relevant health authorities, reaffirms the centrality of self-sanitary hygiene control.
Self-inspection can be carried out, by microenterprises, (4) through the proper application of good hygienic practices of the relevant operational sector. It is therefore necessary to pay appropriate attention to the best practice documents prepared by professional associations, make them their own so as to implement them in practice, share them with staff, and verify their effective implementation. The keeping of records–of incoming raw materials, and of food chilling or freezing processes–is part of this.
The European Commission has recently clarified the above with a special Communication that shows, in Annex III, the ‘Flexibility under EU legislation for certain food establishments‘. (5) For the express purpose of ‘ensuring the proportionality of control measures, adapting them to the nature and size of the establishment.’
In concrete terms – taking into account the characteristics of the activities of micro-enterprises (public establishments, as well as artisan workshops) – the attention of the legislator and the Control Authorities is focused on the primary role of Hygienic Pre-Requirements (aka, good hygiene practices) as essential and at the same time indispensable tools for preventing food safety risks.
C – Controls and penalties
Good hygiene practices-and HACCP, in larger facilities-are therefore the vademecum for ensuring hygiene in restaurants. Their effective implementation, in addition to the record keeping essential to this, is the basis for approaching official public audits with confidence.
In fact, the penalties are rooted precisely in compliance with the rules on traceability and hygiene mentioned above (6). The same offense in Article 5 of Law 283/1962 punishes the most serious contraventions of good hygienic practices.
Penalties related to consumer information will soon take effect and include fines of up to 24,000 euros (halved, for microenterprises) for failure to indicate allergens on the menu. An omission in turn symptomatic of a lack of self-control.
In conclusion, it is imperative to prevent security risks such as those of administrative penalties and criminal prosecution. To this end, every public business operator must devote himself once and for all to implementing, sharing with employees and verifying an effective system of good hygiene practices. Other solutions unfortunately do not exist.
Dario Dongo
Notes
(1) HACCP, Hazard Analysis on Critical Control Points. V. reg. EC 852/04, so-called Hygiene Regulation 1
(2) Cf. d.lgs. 155/97, implementing the c.d. Hygiene directive (dir. 1993/43/EEC, repealed by the subsequent EC reg. 852/04 referred to in Note 1)
(3) See reg. EC 852/04, general rules applicable to the whole of production. Official public controls, in turn, follow the criteria defined in EU Regulation 625/2017 (repealing the previous EC Reg. 882/04)
(4) Microenterprises are defined in the European lexicon as those with fewer than 10 employees and an annual turnover or budget of less than €2 million
(5) See Communication 2016/C 278/01 ‘on theimplementation of food safety management systems concerning prerequisite programs (PRPs) and procedures based on HACCP principles, including facilitation/flexibility for implementation in certain food businesses‘, at http://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/IT/TXT/HTML/?uri=CELEX:52016XC0730(01)&from=EN
(6) Cf. d.lgs. 190/06 (Penalty discipline for violations of EC Regulation No. 178/02) and d.lgs. 193/07 (containing, in Article 6, penalties relating to violations of the rules set forth in Hygiene Regulation 1 et seq.)
Dario Dongo, lawyer and journalist, PhD in international food law, founder of WIISE (FARE - GIFT - Food Times) and Égalité.
