People who work around open food may contaminate the food or surfaces that the food may come into contact with. Personnel are both reservoirs and vectors of microorganisms and can act as a source of microbial contamination to food products. The word hygiene usually refers to cleanliness and especially to any practice that leads to the absence or reduction of harmful infectious agents (Jumaa, 2005). This chapter deals with the mechanisms of product contamination caused by personnel and the ways in which it can be reduced and controlled by sound employee and visitor hygiene practices. The subject of personal hygiene is constantly evolving and, by its very nature of being ‘personal’, is influenced by a range of ethnic, cultural and personal views. Advice on personal hygiene is always available, both for food handlers and within the medical field, from government agencies, and technical reviews including Guzewich and Ross, 1999a, Guzewich and Ross, 1999b, Paulson (2000), Taylor and Holah (2000) and Smith (2009).

In the food industry the term ‘personnel’ is often taken to mean only operatives employed on the factory floor, but it should also include managers, engineers, contractors and visitors. Successful training and control measures for these operatives, who routinely handle food products, can be negated if other people passing through the processing area do not adhere to the same control meas…

Direct contamination involves the transfer of microorganisms from people to the food product by direct physical contact. The contamination may be a result of the transfer of microorganisms naturally harboured on or in the body acting as a reservoir or it may result from translocation of transient organisms. Translocation occurs by people acting as ...

12.3.1. Management’s responsibility

To ensure that the company’s personal hygiene policy can be fully met, the company should ensure that facilities are in place to both enable and encourage operatives to fulfil its requirements. This could include the following: •• Provision should be made for the storage (e.g. a refrigerator) and re-heating (e.g. a microwave and a kettle) of staff’s own food if they wish to eat their own food and/or if a canteen service is not provided (some restrictions could be put in place due to allergen control). •• Suitable changing facilities for both sexes containing storage facilities for outside clothing and suitable toilet facilities, which do not open directly into food processing areas, should be provided. Factory clothing should be stored separately from outside clothing. •• Clean protective clothing should be provided daily. Following work activities, sufficient laundry bins for soiled clothing should be available. •• Hand wash facilities should be available, comprising non-hand-operated taps, liquid soap (in a cartridge form with an antibacterial agent to prevent bacterial growth in the soap) and appropriate hand drying facilities. •• Wherever possible, changing facilities should be sited to allow direct access to food processing areas without operatives having to traverse external areas. •• Alcohol dispensers may be provided for personnel to apply to hands just prior to work activities. •• Signs should be post…