Quality Assurance

Enterprises from the feedstuff sector, agriculture, meat production and processing, the food retailing trade and the Central Marketing Organization of German Agricultural Industries CMA (Centrale Marketing-Gesellschaft der deutschen Agrarwirtschaft mbH) have together created a new comprehensive concept for ensuring product quality and origin, starting with meat and meat products.

In order to implement this concept, the production, processing and marketing stages of the meat chain, along with the CMA in close cooperation with the Ministry for Consumer Protection, Food and Agriculture, have formed an association - "QS - Quality and Safety for Food Products, from Producer to Consumer".
Everyone is pulling together - making QS into an alliance for active consumer protection. 

Food safety and food production are very much under discussion at the present time. In the past, consumers often felt that they were left alone with their fears - and their confidence in the safety of meat and processed meat products has never really been fully restored.
This lack of confidence has led to intensive discussions between all those involved in the production and marketing of meat, from the feedstuff industry through farming and abattoirs up to processors and sales outlets as well as with the CMA - Centrale Marketing-Gesellschaft der deutschen Agrarwirtschaft mbH. All of them agree that it is essential to work together in order to develop a comprehensive concept for ensuring the quality and origin of meat. This in turn will make it possible to manage the final quality of the meat and processed meat products and to regain the confidence of consumers over the long term. The QS alliance - Quality and Safety for Food Products, from Producer to Consumer - was established in order to put the concept into practice. 

QS is a quality assurance system for food products which covers all stages of the product lifetime, starting with meat and meat products.
Only joint implementation at all stages make it possible to create an effective system covering all areas which will secure quality and safety at all levels of the meat production and processing chain.  


A comprehensive system - covering all stages for all products

QS is a comprehensive system, not only in terms of the stages which it covers, but also with regard to the range of products examined. It is the quality assurance and control system for the total range of meat and meat products and applies for veal and beef products in exactly the same way as for pork and mutton and their derivatives. The QS standards apply for both domestic and imported products. QS specifies that there should be reliable documentation and self-assessment at all stages of the production and distribution process. The effectiveness of the self-testing is then checked by means of independent controls. QS includes all process levels in the monitoring and testing process and this results in a convincing system of controls which extend from the stable to the shop counter. The system is built on fixed and uniform standards.

QS provides unified standards for every stage from birth and feeding through slaughtering and processing up to presentation at the final point of sale. Observation of these standards is not only tested by independent, accredited test institutes when the approval mark is first given, but also thereafter at regular intervals. The test criteria which have been developed by QS are in many respects stricter or more comprehensive than the legal requirements. The requirements at each individual level you get at www.q-s.info

Conformance of the various companies and organisations with the system is ensured by means of: Physical inspection and Administrative inspection.The three stages of the QS test mark control system:

1. Self-assessment
2. Independent controls
3. Control of the independent control bodies

Sanctions
Independent control bodies have the task of carrying out inspections and establishing the results of these. Any sanctions which are necessary are decided and initiated by the independent Sanctions Committee.

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