HACCP Plan Cost: Team Time, Training, Equipment and Maintenance

What makes up the cost of a HACCP plan?

Eight cost items, the first of which is your teams’ time. External purchases, such as training, instruments, testing and validation expertise, come next and depend directly on the number and nature of your CCPs.

Law 28-07 on the safety of food products is Morocco’s food safety law, and Decree 2-10-473 its implementing decree. We do not publish a standard price: two canneries of the same size can have very different costs depending on their can formats, their recipes and the state of their facilities. The diagnostic puts a figure on each item for your site.

How much time must the team put in?

The study time depends on three factors: the number of HACCP studies, the state of the prerequisite programmes and how available production is to confirm the flow diagrams. It is not reduced by skipping steps.

The number of studies. The Foundation FSSC defines a HACCP study as the hazard analysis for a family of products, processes or services with similar hazards (Version 7 FAQ). Grouping products into coherent families reduces the work; mixing different processes in a single study creates gaps.

The prerequisite programmes. If cleaning, water, pest control or maintenance are neither written nor recorded, the team first spends its time putting them back in place. That is time well spent: a HACCP plan laid over weak good hygiene practices ends up multiplying CCPs.

Production. Flow diagrams are confirmed on the line, at all operation stages and for all shifts (IFS 2.3.5.1). In a seasonal activity, this means working during the season, not during the technical shutdown.

The time to plan for does not stop at the HACCP team: each operator who monitors a CCP spends time measuring and recording, and each manager who verifies spends time reading and signing (BRCGS 2.10.2).

What equipment and testing should you plan for?

One instrument per critical limit, suited to what it measures and calibrated, plus the testing your verification programme provides for. The choice starts from the limits, not the other way round.

The FAO lists temperature, time, moisture level, pH, aw and conveyor belt speed as common critical limit parameters. BRCGS invites sites to consider online, offline or continuous measurement, and requires discontinuous sampling to remain representative of the batch (2.10.1). Continuous measurement costs more to buy; it can cut monitoring time and the blind spots between two checks. It is a trade-off to be made CCP by CCP.

On the laboratory side, Decree 2-10-473 accepts own-check testing carried out in an in-house or contract laboratory, provided it is recognised under the arrangements set by the minister (Article 42). For analyses critical to product safety, BRCGS requires a laboratory with recognised accreditation or one operating in accordance with the requirements and principles of ISO/IEC 17025 (5.6.6), and FSSC 22000 Version 7 requires testing of parameters critical to food safety to be performed in accordance with the applicable requirements of that standard (2.5.1). Budget for the real sampling plan, not a one-off test just before the audit.

Validation, finally, is the most variable item. A limit can often be validated with existing studies from credible sources; a heat treatment or a new process may require trials and external expertise, to be repeated at each change of format, recipe or equipment.

What does maintaining the plan cost each year?

A predictable amount of time, to be written into the budget: a HACCP plan is not a one-off project. The standards set minimum frequencies that come back every year:

• review of the plan and the prerequisite programmes at least annually and before any change (BRCGS 2.12.3);
• verification at least once within a 12-month period (IFS 2.3.11.2);
• on-site confirmation of the flow diagrams at least annually (BRCGS 2.6.1);
• training of new starters, agency and temporary staff and seasonal workers before they start work (BRCGS 7.1.1);
• calibration of instruments and verification testing;
• follow-up of the recommendations made after sanitary inspection visits by ONSSA (Office National de Sécurité Sanitaire des Produits Alimentaires, Morocco’s national food safety authority), which may call for works, training or a strengthening of the own-check system (Decree 2-10-473, Article 23).

A failing plan costs more. Loss of control means isolating and assessing all product made during the deviation (BRCGS 2.11.1). A non-conformity found during a visit can lead to suspension of the approval, with no more than six months to come back into compliance, then to its withdrawal; a danger to health leads to immediate withdrawal (Decree 2-10-473, Articles 17 and 18). Under IFS, CCP monitoring is a KO requirement (2.3.9.1): scored D, it means the certificate cannot be issued.

How do you keep this cost under control without weakening the plan?

By sizing the plan on the real hazards and reusing the same work for the inspectorate, the buyer and certification. Lasting savings come from the method, not from cuts.

• Classify accurately. One CCP too many costs an instrument, a record and a verification at every workstation. A measure that requires greater attention is monitored against a criterion, without the full apparatus of a CCP.
• Keep one plan. The same plan, written to the Codex, meets Decree 2-10-473 and the GFSI-recognised standards: see our HACCP plan Morocco guide.
• Train in-house. A trained HACCP team keeps the plan up to date without starting from scratch at each change.
• Fund the training. Training in your training plan may qualify for the special training contracts (contrats spéciaux de formation, CSF) of the OFPPT (Office de la formation professionnelle et de la promotion du travail, Morocco’s vocational training office), under their rules; the process and a simulation, with no promised amount, are on our CSF funding page.
• Equip your records. Records kept at the workstation and filed by batch reduce verification time and search time during audits.

Checklist for budgeting your HACCP plan

• List of product families and planned HACCP studies.
  
• State of good hygiene practices and any works needed.
  
• Provisional number of CCPs and of measures requiring greater attention.
  
• Inventory of existing instruments, those to buy and those to calibrate.
  
• Validations to carry out and external expertise required.
  
• Sampling plan and recognised laboratories.
  
• Training plan: HACCP team, operators, seasonal workers, supervisors.
  
• Annual time for review, verification and internal audit.
  

For the step-by-step method, see our article on how to build a HACCP plan; for a concrete example, item by item, see our sardine cannery case study.