HACCP enables the producer to achieve a safe product continuously.
The concept and reduction to practice of the Hazard Analysis Critical Control Point (HACCP) system was directly related to the Pillsbury Company’s projects in food production and research for the space programme.
HACCP was developed originally as a microbiological safety system in the early days of US manned space programme, as it was vital to ensure the safety of food for the astronauts.
The pathway to the HACCP system started in 1959 when Pillsbury was asked to produce a food that could be used under zero gravity conditions in the space capsules.
The basics were developed by Pillsbury Company with the cooperation and participation of the National Aeronautics and Space Agency (NASA). The Natick Laboratories of the US Armed Forces, and the US Air Force Space Laboratory Project group.
It was based on the engineering system, Failure, Mode and Effect Analysis (FMEA), which looks at what could potentially go wrong at each stage in an operation together with possible causes and the likely effect.
The HACCP system as the people know today took form at the 1971 National Conference on Food Protection.
Around that time hazard analysis procedures were adopted to plan critical control points designed to control the hazards in the food system.
It started with the fact that no one really knew how foods and especially particulates might act in zero gravity. The initial conservative approach to solve this problem was to produce bite sized foods covered with flexible edible coating to prevent crumbling and consequently atmospheric contamination.
The Early History of HACCP
