YOUR QUESTIONS. ANSWERED.
Where does the information contained in the App come from?
All information in the App comes from the publicly available meat audit reports published by the UK Food Standards Agency.
Who are the FSA?
The FSA is the UK Food Standards Agency (www.food.gov.uk). The FSA is responsible for food safety and food hygiene across the UK. The FSA works with local authorities to enforce food safety regulations and have staff who work in UK meat plants to check that the requirements of the regulations are being met. The FSA also commissions research related to food safety.
What is the FSA audit?
The FSA carries out routine audits of approved meat establishments (that is slaughterhouses, cutting plants and game handling establishments) in Great Britain. In Northern Ireland, these audits are carried out by the Department of Agriculture and Rural Development (DARD) on behalf of the FSA.
These audits have two main aims:
(1) to make sure that food business operators are complying with food law requirements; and
(2) to ensure that food business operators are meeting relevant standards in relation to public health and, in slaughterhouses, animal health and welfare.
How often are audits carried out?
When determining how often the FSA audits a business, the FSA looks at the type of processes carried out, the throughput and the food business operator’s record of compliance. The greater the potential risk to public health and, in slaughterhouses, to animal health and welfare, the more often the FSA will audit. The audit frequency currently varies from at least once every two months, to three, twelve or eighteen months.
What do the Audit Outcome scores mean?
During an audit inspection the FSA assesses the compliance of the operator with certain standards of operation. Categories of assessment include Animal Welfare, Animal Health and Hygienic Production standards. Compliance and/or level of non-compliance is recorded against each assessed category. The number, and level, of non-compliances recorded during an audit inspection determines the score the operator achieves.
- Good: No major or critical non-compliances on the day of the audit or during the audit period
- Generally Satisfactory: No more than 2 major non-compliances during audit or during audit period which were rectified promptly and no critical non-compliances during the audit period
- Improvement Necessary: 3 – 6 major non-compliances during the audit or during the audit period but no critical non-compliances during the audit period
- Urgent Improvement Necessary: 1 critical or >6 major non-compliances during the audit or during the audit period
Does an “Urgent Improvement Necessary” rating mean that the food is unsafe to eat?
The FSA monitors meat produced from operators to make sure it is safe. Where available, the App shows you the level of compliance of an operator with FSA standards for hygiene processes and animal welfare. With the App you can tell if an operator is “best in the class” for compliance or “could do better” -whether they score Good, Generally Satisfactory, Improvement Necessary or Urgent Improvement Necessary. Rest assured, if there were any concerns about an imminent risk to public health the FSA would intervene.
What meats are covered by the App?
The App covers many meat products including chicken, poultry, beef, pork and lamb.
What doesn’t the App tell me?
The App only tells you about the meat operators where the meat was last handled, slaughtered, processed or packaged. This is because the App is dependent on publicly available data published by the FSA. So, the App cannot tell you where the original animal was reared – that full supply chain data is not publicly available. The App also only relates to meat cuts and mince and so will not cover meat-based products such as ready meals. Although these latter products do contain an EU Identification Mark, the data in respect of these codes is not currently publicly available.
Why do I get an error message?
This is because the information in respect of a code is not yet publicly available and therefore cannot be retrieved by the App.
I have a code with both letters and numbers. Why can’t I see any audit data?
These meat operators are monitored by local authorities rather than the FSA. At the moment this information is not publicly available so we can’t show you the results.
Why is the animal species of the meat-product I searched not appearing in the results page?
This means that the meat operator is not slaughtering, cutting or processing meat of that animal species at the facility. In addition to their own operations, certain operators also prepare, package or store pre-cut meats which they have received from other operators. Unfortunately the meat-types for these activities are not captured in the publicly-available data sets.
Does the App tell me if the meat has been slaughtered in compliance with halal standards?
We have had many requests around halal identification and clearly consumers would like more information and choice in this area. At the moment we haven’t found any public / government open data to support identifying this in the App but we are continuing to look for other data sets.
How can I learn more?
The information presented in the App is publicly available information published on the United Kingdom Food Standards Agency website. It is reproduced in the App under the terms of the UK Open Government Licence.
We really encourage users of the App to visit the Food Standards Agency’s website directly to learn more about the audit of meat establishments. For more information on the FSA audits, click here.
I believe the information on the App is wrong. How can this be rectified?
Every effort is made to ensure that the information provided in the Application is accurate and up to date. If you believe the information is incorrect, please get in touch with us at contact@wheresthisfrom.com and we will investigate as soon as possible.