Food Safety Webinars for 2010 To learn more about food safety, attend one of our FREE webinars. Click on the webinar titles below to view details or register. Documentation: the Key to a Successful Food Safety Quality Program Date/Time: On Demand Cost: FREE The Importance of Ongoing Food Safety Training Date/Time: On Demand Cost: FREE Recall Readiness: How Prepared Is Your Company to Survive a Recall? Date: September 23, 2010 Time: 1:00 pm ET Cost: FREE Detection Methods to Ensure Thorough Inspection in the 21st Century Date: November 18, 2010 Time: 1:00 pm ET Cost: FREE

Food Safety and Security Services

TÜV SÜD America Inc. now utilizes its internationally recognized auditing, testing, inspection and certification expertise to support the food safety industry. In Europe, TÜV SÜD's food safety entity, VITACERT, is working with hundreds of clients including farms, producers, retailers and government agencies to improve the safety and quality of the feed and food supply chain, to ensure compliance with local and international requirements as well as increased consumer confidence.

Prevention is key to ensuring a safe food supply. When ordering a meal, whether fine cuisine or fast food, or shopping at the local supermarket, it is naturally assumed that the food will be safe and suitable for consumption. Yet experience tells us that food-borne illness and injury are ever present in our world. Drawing on the methods and technologies successfully used in the European Union, TÜV SÜD America offers food safety & security services in the following areas:

• Training (see our available On-Demand Webinars)
• Auditing/Certification
• Traceability Services
• Food Bio Security
• Animal Welfare
• Specialized Programs to meet your specific needs

Why is food safety a concern?
Every day we are faced with the challenges of meeting ever increasing safety and security demands which stem from events and crises in the United States and abroad. Major food product recalls have illustrated the vulnerability of many food production chains. Recent food safety recall scares, such as the E. coli-tainted spinach, the salmonella-infected tomatoes and peanut butter in the United States, the pesticide-laden rice in Japan, the melamine-laced baby formula milk in China, and the dioxin-contaminated pork in the European Union, has led to illness and deaths. These incidents emphasize the need for a comprehensive farm-to-fork approach on part of manufacturers, processors, and vendors to ensure total quality management across the entire supply chain.

Food recalls cost both manufacturers and exporters millions of dollars and can often cause long-lasting damage to a company's brand reputation. In today's competitive market, all it takes is one costly recall associated with a product to put a company in jeopardy. Food safety is clearly a top priority. Larger companies involved in the global market have begun mandating that their vendors implement a quality management system to ensure the safety of the food they supply.

In the U.S., the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has allocated more than $1 billion in its 2010 budget for food safety initiatives to develop preventative controls to avoid food-borne outbreaks, create an integrated inspection system, and increase information technology used to support food security.

To ensure the safety of their product and effectively manage their supply chain, companies are relying more and more on food safety management systems.

They can also reduce risks and recalls by engaging a single-source food safety partner such as TÜV SÜD America. As this partner, we can help improve operational efficiency, increase transparency within the entire supply chain, add impartiality into the sourcing mechanism, and offer insights on improving process systems.

Links to Online Additional Resources

For more information, contact us.