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Food safety controlled from receipt to dispatch and provable to any buyer
ISO 22000 certifies a food safety management system across the whole chain: hazard analysis, prerequisite programmes, control points that are monitored and verified, traceability in both directions, and a recall procedure that has been tested. It is the system export buyers and retailers expect a supplier to hold.
You need ISO 22000 if…
- !Certified food safety management, or no order: that is how the export buyer has put it.
- !A retailer audit raised findings on traceability and your recall procedure has never been tested.
- !Foreign matter, or an undeclared allergen, and the complaint reached your customer before it reached you.
- !You are commissioning a new line or site and the food safety system has to cover it.
- !Your operation spans processing, storage and transport, and separate certificates keep leaving gaps.
- !A customer has asked for FSSC 22000 and the ISO 22000 base has to be in place first.
A food safety management system standard for any organisation in the food chain: growers, processors, packers, transporters, caterers, and suppliers of ingredients or packaging. It combines hazard analysis with prerequisite programmes and management system discipline.
An accredited certification body issues the certificate. ISO 22000 on its own is not a GFSI-recognised scheme; FSSC 22000 adds sector prerequisite specifications and additional requirements to reach that benchmark.
Three-year certificate with annual surveillance audits, normally scheduled while production is running so controls can be seen operating.
Processors, packers, cold stores, caterers, distributors and ingredient or packaging suppliers whose customers audit food safety before listing them.
Where this certification is demanded
ISO 22000 is applicable across 8 of the 25 industries SIS covers. The pages below set out the specific reason it comes up in each one.
What ISO 22000 Actually Requires
The backbone an implementer has to build, in the order it usually gets built.
Define the sites, products and processes covered, then put prerequisite programmes in place: cleaning, pest control, water quality, personal hygiene, maintenance and layout.
Top management sets policy and appoints a competent multidisciplinary food safety team with the authority to hold product and stop a line.
Describe products and process flows, verify them on the floor, then identify biological, chemical, physical and allergen hazards at each step and assess significance.
Assign each significant hazard to an operational prerequisite programme or a critical control point, with validated limits, monitoring and defined corrective action.
Trace one step back and one step forward with mass balance, and maintain a withdrawal and recall procedure that is exercised rather than merely written.
Verify controls through sampling, records review and internal audit, hold management review, and update the hazard analysis whenever product, process or equipment changes.
How ISO 22000 Certification Works
No black box. A defined, time-bound route from first call to certificate in hand.
Application & Proposal
Scoping depends on product categories and their risk, number of sites and production lines, shift patterns, seasonality, and whether storage and transport sit inside the certified boundary.
1–2 daysGap Review & Readiness
The prerequisite programmes are running. Ask for last quarter’s allergen changeover records and you get a description instead of a form, because nobody was ever asked to sign one.
1–2 weeksStage 1 + Stage 2 Audit
Stage 1 reviews hazard analysis, prerequisite programmes, flow diagrams and the verification plan. Stage 2 walks the line during production: CCP records, temperature logs, calibration, changeover and a traceability exercise.
Scheduled during productionCertificate Issued
The certificate names the sites and product categories a retailer’s vendor form asks for. Annual surveillance lands mid-production and works backwards from a batch you did not choose.
Valid 3 yearsIndustries That Need ISO 22000
Commonly taken alongside
Not Sure Which Certification You Need?
Three questions. The selector reads the same industry-to-standard mapping this whole site is built on, then shortlists what applies to you.
Which sector best describes your organisation?
Your production calendar sets the audit date, not us
If your line runs seasonally, the audit window is not a preference, it is the whole schedule. Name the months you are in production; that one fact fixes most of the proposal.
Get My Free Quote →What ISO 22000 Changes for Your Business
Certification is not a certificate on the wall. It is a working system that pays for itself.
Export orders stop being blocked
Buyers and importing customers accept an accredited certificate as evidence of hazard control, which removes a common condition on listing a new supplier.
Traceability that survives a test
Mass balance and both-direction traceability mean a mock recall completes in hours. A retailer audit measures that; it does not take your word for it.
Allergen control gets specific
Segregation, changeover validation and label verification address the failure that causes most recalls, rather than treating allergens as one more hazard.
Cold chain becomes evidence
Temperature limits, calibrated monitoring and defined corrective action turn a cold-chain break from an argument with a customer into a documented decision.
A step toward FSSC 22000
ISO 22000 is the management system half of FSSC 22000, so certifying it first shortens the route if a retailer later demands a GFSI-recognised scheme.
One system, whole chain
The standard covers processing, storage and transport together, so a business doing all three is certified once instead of holding disconnected certificates.
Knowledge Base - Downloads
Practical documents prepared by our auditors. Fill the short form once and every download on the page unlocks.
ISO 22000:2018 implementation guide for food operations
How the two risk levels work, where OPRPs differ from CCPs, and what verification evidence an auditor expects on the floor.
Hazard analysis and control plan
Process step, hazard type, significance, control measure, classification, critical limit, monitoring and corrective action in one working sheet.
Mock recall and traceability exercise
How to run a timed exercise, what mass balance figures to record, and the result an auditor or retailer will accept.
From ISO 22000 to FSSC 22000
What the sector prerequisite specification and the additional scheme requirements add on top, and what the upgrade audit actually examines.
Frequently Asked Questions
Straight answers to what buyers ask before they commit to ISO 22000.
What is the difference between ISO 22000 and FSSC 22000?
How is ISO 22000 different from HACCP certification?
What is the difference between an OPRP and a CCP?
Can transport and storage be certified under ISO 22000?
Do audits have to happen while we are producing?
Does the certificate cover all our products and sites?
Start ISO 22000 certification with an accredited body
Audit dates get planned around your production season and shift pattern. A line that is not running tells an auditor nothing, and an accredited certificate has to mean something.
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