A core element to the defence of food is a systematic evaluation of vulnerable elements of the supply chain carried out by an experienced and trusted team. This has been called 'Threat Assessment Critical Control Point (TACCP)'. The evaluation reflects established procedures for risk management and it is likely that organizations will increasingly incorporate it into crisis and/or business continuity management frameworks.One of the major guiding documents for TACCP is the PAS 96:2010 Defending food and drink Guidance for the deterrence, detection and defeat of ideologically motivated and other forms of malicious attack on food and drink and their supply arrangements which was developed in 2008 by the Centre for the Protection of National Infrastructure (CPNI) in consultation with food manufacturers (such as Heinz, Kellogg, Kraft), organisations (including Food Standards Agency, National Farmers Union, Food & Drink Federation) and retailers (examples Sainsbury, Tesco, Marks & Spencer). This was reviewed in 2010 and updated. At the 2013 GFSI conference in Barcelona, Terry Donohoe from the Food Standards Agency gave a talk on "The identification of future food safety risks" which specifically mentioned TACCP, the PAS 96, and the need to look for threat points, hazard points and value points in the process of ensuring safe food. Insight and ability to identify and address threats that are identified by the assessment process, and to close any gaps in the organisations due diligence defence. Roles that would benefit from attending the training are Technical and Quality Managers from within organisations, but also staff from manufacturing, purchasing and those responsible for site security and HR. There are many sections within the course, and the PAS 96 that are covered, starting with malicious, idealogically motivated threats to food and food supply, and introducing some case studies on this subject. It moves on to broad themes of food defence, which covers the complexity of the food supply web, for which an illustration is given using Sudan 1 dye contamination from 2005. The TACCP process itself is then defined, with key considerations including drafting a detailed process flow chart for the product from "farm to fork" (a key difference to HACCP) and assessing the likelihood of routine procedures detecting such contamination. A vital part of the PAS is the section which covers assessing the threat, which details a large number of questions and considerations for: the product; the premises; and the business. Areas including assuring personnel security, controlling access to premises, services, the processes and materials, as well as the secure storage of transport vehicles are listed.
