Bauermeister, 2009 – Validation of SSOPs Used in the Egg Industry and Developing an Online Egg HACCP Training Course

To address the research outlined in Objective 1 of this project, Develop Egg HACCP Training materials a database has been compiled containing the contact individuals for food safety/HACCP from each egg company. Comprehensive HACCP surveys were completed at egg companies. These surveys included information on company demographics, pre-requisite programs and HACCP programs. From the surveys we determined that most companies have implemented HACCP programs in some capacity using the HACCP regulations that currently exist for meat processing facilities. Most larger companies, have successfully implemented HACCP programs, including the necessary pre-requisite programs. However, some of the smaller companies did not have programs that would be considered to be complete under the HACCP regulations as they are currently written. The smaller companies did not have Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs) and Sanitary SOPs (SSOPs) that would be considered complete under regulated HACCP. Smaller companies may not have all the resources that larger companies have and may need some additional help in implementing HACCP and the pre-requisite programs. In addition, our results indicate that further processed egg facilities are better prepared for mandated HACCP than the shell egg processors, many further processors already operate under HACCP programs because it has been requested by a customer. Although, many processors have already implemented HACCP programs, continuing training programs in this area will be important and training for companies that need to add to their HACCP programs will be very important.