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This article will explain step by step how to design, implement and communicate a national risk-based food inspection system. The use of harmonized risk-based food inspection systems in different regions has many advantages as it standardizes the use of risk analysis principles in food inspection and allows countries to recognize inspection systems implemented by their trade countries. These actions will ultimately facilitate the safe trade of food products and reduce the public health impact of foodborne diseases.

Establish the scope:

Designing a new nationwide food inspection system can be challenging. The first step in designing a new risk-based inspection system is to decide on the scope. It is recommended that the country or regulatory agency address the following questions to orient themselves in defining the scope of the food inspection system.

Collect information:

The second step in designing a new inspection system is to collect information on the characteristics of food establishments and the type of foods they manufacture.

Food establishments:

Regulatory agencies need a database of food establishments nationwide that produce a specific food category, such as RTE meat products. To create the database, the following information is required:

• Total number of establishments within a specific food chain;
• Address of food establishment; z Number of employees;
• Type of food categories produced;
• Annual volume of production per food category;
• History of noncompliance from previous inspections; and
• Product recalls related to food produced in the establishment.

Food categories:

There are a large number of products and producing establishments in any given country. Each food chain, such as dairy products, RTE meat products, seafood and fishery, will have a high number of specific food products, including regionally different products, for example, various types of sausages. To facilitate this task, it is important to group the different foods by category, which is intended to group products that have similar raw materials, processes or technological characteristics. Food categories are defined in each food chain to reduce the total number of products to be categorized.

Categorize Risk:

Principles of risk categorization:

Risk categorization is defined as a risk management activity that uses a scientific process to identify food safety priorities and assign resources accordingly. A definition that is important for regulatory agencies to understand is hazard and risk.

Risk categorization tools:

Decision Trees:

Decision trees are tools to qualitatively categorize (low-, medium- or high-risk) the food safety risk of different food products. Decision trees are built by using questions related to how the food is produced in an establishment and answering with a yes/ no answer. This is a recommendable tool when the country does not have data on the prevalence of pathogens or chemical residues in different food products. Decision trees are very useful as well when the country must categorize many food products, and the tool can be used to identify foods that are low-risk and thus do not pose a risk to consumers.

Risk Matrices:

Risk matrices are tools to quantitatively categorize the food safety risk of different food products. It is recommended to use quantitative risk matrices over qualitative matrices due to being more objective and allowing a clear mathematical relationship between probability and severity. Risk matrices can also be used to categorize the establishments by their inherent risk.

Multicriteria Decision Analysis:

Multicriteria decision analysis (MCDA) is a quantitative tool to incorporate more variables than probability and severity. Countries use MCDA to calculate relative risk by incorporating different risk factors related to food production, public health and economic impact, among others.

Food risk categorization:

Categorization of foods by risk is an important step in establishing inspection priorities. At this stage, the food categories in a country or specific food chain and the risk categorization tool (such as a decision tree) should have been defined by the regulatory agency. Each food category needs to be evaluated and a risk level assigned.

In general, risk levels depend on the likelihood that the food may be contaminated with a pathogen or chemical hazard, the control measures used during processing to reduce the hazard and the possibility of recontamination or growth during processing or shelf life. In turn, the fact that a food is ready for consumption may present a higher risk because it does not have a subsequent heat treatment that destroys pathogenic microorganisms.

Risk categorization of food businesses:

Once foods have been categorized by their level of risk, proceed to the identification and selection of the factors that allow the categorization of establishments by risk by following the MCDA methodology.

• Identify the risk factors related to the establishment
• Assign numerical scales within each factor
• Combine the risk factors.
• Establish a weighting on each factor (%)
• Calculate the final risk score by combining the factors and weightings.

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