News

New BRC fees and date of implementation of BRC V 8

BRC increases the fee and the date of implementation is known.

BRC will offer new services through their portal to better control the food chain The details are not yet known.

For this reason the BRC has increased the fee from GBP 300 to GBP 450 (Euro 510) for all audits from 1 August 2018, so before the implementation of version 8.

The fees for the additional modules have all been aligned to GBP 100 (Euro 115), for each of these modules (ASDA, FSMA, etc.), with the exception of the Food Safety Culture Excellence v2 module. The ASDA fee is not yet definitively confirmed.

The new version will be applicable for all BRC audits from 1 February 2019 (and not from 1 January 2019 as communicated in our Newsletter).

News about BRC Food Issue 8

BRC Food Draft Issue 8 available.

BRC Food is currently being revised, with publication of issue 8 expected in August 2018. This new issue will apply for all BRC audits from February 2019.

You can consult and download for free the draft standard here (Information about standards).

The main changes expected are summarised below:

  • Introduction of a new Food Safety Culture approach in the first section concerning management and their commitment, with requirements on the setting up of a strategy for the development and improvement of a corporate culture in food safety with, for example, an internal communication system to feed back operational information to the management.
  • Review of some of the terminology of the HACCP system in order to comply with various international legislation, such as the FSMA.
  • A review of the requirements on Food Defence, with a focus on the analysis of internal and external risks (threat).
  • A more stringent approach for controlling subcontracted activities and processes, such as the obligation for GFSI recognized certification for subcontractors.
  • More detailed requirements on the monitoring of the production environment for risk products, with details on sampling, frequency, methods, the aims of analyses carried out on pathogens and alteration.
  • Introduction of pet food into the scope of the BRC
  • Grouping together of current requirements in high-risk and high-care zones, which in principle remain unchanged, into a single new section, section 8.
  • The current voluntary module on traded goods will become a full part of BRC Food, with a new section 9.
  • The disappearance of option 2 of the unannounced audit. This means that there will only be two options (no obligation): the announced or totally unannounced audit.

Next steps?

Seminars will be offered in Autumn 2018.