Food safety is a worldwide concern because of its importance to public health and impact on international trade. Significant increase in the incidence of reported food borne diseases and the emergence of new borne pathogens is a major concern. This necessitated the seafood export firms to implement food safety standards to assure quality and safety of food, to gain entry to more markets and enhance market share.
The paper presents the result of a survey of 70 Seafood export firms in Alapuzha and Ernakulam districts in Kerala to understand the barriers in implementing food safety management system. The seafood standards implemented in the seafood firms in the study area are ISO 22000:2005. HACCP, BRC, IFS - FOOD, FSSC 22000, Food safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI), FSSC 22000, IFS, EU certificate. The Audits are carried out by Export Inspection Agency (EIA), Bureau Veritas, Société Générale de Surveillance (SGS), Det Norske Veritas (DNV) and Intertek twice in a year. The barriers to implement FSMS are identified with varimax rotation of exploratory factor analysis using principle component analysis. The constraints were extracted from 15 variables to six factors. The Six factors defined 68.92% of variance. The factors identified are organisational barrier with 18.513% variance (lack of understanding, lack of training, lack of skilled employees), managerial barrier, 13.732% (top management commitment, ineffective communication, lack of employees motivation), organisational and culture barrier, 12% (employees resistance to change, employees absenteeism), economic barrier, 10.2% (high cost for certification, lack of infrastructure facilities), technical barrier, 8% (lengthy documentation procedure, time, difficulty in performing internal audit), and external barrier, 7% (insufficient financial aid from government, need to depend on external certification body). Identifying food safety management standards in place and the factors that hinder its implementation allows the seafood processing industry to control different hazards affecting the health of consumers.
Keywords: Food Safety, Seafood safety, Food Safety Management System, ISO 22000: 2005, Seafood Industries, Constraints