Risk Assessment in a Restaurant - Coursework Example

Risk assessment in a restaurant Introduction Running a restaurant involves series of activities; and these activities have some risks in them that may affect the overall efficiency of how the restaurant is being managed. This report concentrates on the assessment of risks in a restaurant, and offers possible risk management strategies that could used to tackle the risks. Report methodology This report follows the quantitative research method by making use of general theories, inferences, ideologies and other reports on restaurants, analyzing and presenting an argument on the issue of risk assessment in a restaurant. Description of the workplace A restaurant involves many activities that include but not limited to cooking of foods, serving the foods, cleaning the restaurant, management of restaurant operations, and security. Whether small or big, every restaurant undertakes the activities mentioned above. But this report would be looking at the risks involved in the cooking and serving aspects of a restaurant. Every restaurant has a kitchen: and the quality of food served in a restaurant depends on the how hygienic its kitchen is. The risks associated with cooking in a restaurant come in different forms: One, this could be using contaminated condiments or foodstuff; this occurs, for instance, when foodstuffs are obtained from farms that use dangerous pesticide or other harmful chemicals. Two, there are risks in the process of cooking; the cooks might be hurt and badly injured by fire, hot water or hot oil spurting out of the frying pans. The two risks highlighted above are common to every restaurant, no matter where it is situated. Serving foods in a restaurant also entails many risks (Cannon and Tarcy 2001). It has been reported that some restaurants have menus that are not descriptive enough for customers to know the contents of the meal they are served. And this has caused a major health problem when a customer was exposed to more cancer risks because of what he/she has eaten (Magat and Viscusi 1992). The question of what to serve to whom must be taken very seriously. This is because some customers have allergies that may lead to death if care is not taken to prevent that customer from consuming such foods. Hygiene issue is also important: and one of the commonest risks is serving food to the customers with filthy hands or materials that could cause either bacterial or viral infections for the customers. This is a major health risk. The principles of risk assessment 　　　　　　The following are the necessary steps of principles that could guarantee a complete risk assessment in a restaurant, as highlighted by Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO 2006). (a) Hazard identification: This is the first step in risk management. It indicates that a risk manager or supervisor in the restaurant identifies the potential poison or contamination in the foods or foodstuffs. This is a routine process that requires the risk manager to observe cautiously all the materials that are used in the cooking process. The risk supervisor has to work cooperatively with the cooks, kitchen workers and all other staff directly or indirectly involved in the cooking and serving aspects. (b) Hazard characterization: It is not only enough to identify a hazard, whether in form of dangerous chemicals in foodstuffs or bacteria in the materials used for serving the cooked foods, but it is as well important to characterize these hazards. Where are they coming from? What kind of things they are? What are their constituents? What kinds of damage they could do to the bodies of the customers? How about the polluted water or expired drinks? What is responsible for this problem? This step would make it easy for the restaurateur to be aware of the grave dangers involved in serving bad foods to her/her customers. (c) Exposure assessment: This is a significant step in the sense it investigates how many customers are exposed to these food hazards and how were they exposed to them? Thoughts would be given to the way to handle the rate of exposure. During this step, regular customers may be invited for medical check ups to detect if they have allergies that were not initially reported to the restaurant staff. The risk manager would communicate elaborately with the customers to find out how much they have been affected by the food poisoning or other chemicals. In a big restaurant, this process is really cumbersome, but it is always helpful to act safely. Risk characterization: According to Food and Agriculture Organization of United Nations, risk characterization is “the qualitative and quantitative estimation, including attendant uncertainties, of the probability of occurrence and severity of known or potential adverse health effects in a given population based on hazard identification, hazard characterization and exposure assessment. Risk characterization involves integration of the hazard characterization and exposure assessment”. From above definition, it is clear that the risk managers or supervisors at the restaurants have a big job to make sure that all the information about the food hazards from the customers and staff’s observation be utilized to prevent further spread of these risks. If the four principles of risk assessment are considered cleverly, the restaurateurs avoid the legal repercussions of their lazy attitude to identifying and dealing with hazards in their restaurants. The legal requirement for risk assessment in a restaurant Before opening a restaurant, it is expected that the restaurateur should be familiar with these legal requirements for risk assessment as explained below: (a) Food safety: It is required, by law, that every restaurateur is expected to have knowledge of food safety. The local health authorities in the town or city where the restaurant is to be located often gives out lectures, seminars and other important educative programs on the issue of how to provide safe food to the customers. Knowing about food safety indicates that the restaurateur fully understands the importance of food hygiene, personal hygiene and the use of non-poisonous materials to cook foods for customers (Lawson 1994). This is a serious legal problem if a customer discovers that the restaurant has cooked his/her food using expired cooking condiments or chemically tainted foodstuff. (b) Fire safety regulations: There are regulations laid down by local authorities for the restaurateurs to follow so as to guide against sudden fire outbreak in their restaurants. These may include simple instructions on how to use a fire extinguisher in case fire starts unexpectedly to some pieces of advice on preventing fire outbreak. Since fire is a dangerous irreversible phenomenon, it requires constant seriousness to prevent it continuously (Stellman and International Labor office 1998). (c) No smoking Policy: Health authorities in several localities are so concerned about the negative effect of smoking at the restaurants. Therefore, more and more restaurants are putting up the signs of No-smoking everywhere to abide by the law of their local government. Smoking has been identified as a great health hazard, and health experts are doing everything possible to rid the world of smokers. In some places, smoking in the public area, restaurants included, is like committing a crime of rape, and there are serious consequences if the smokers are caught desecrating the public places (Rabin and Sugarman 1993). (d) Sanitation regulations: In the United States, for example, Food and Drug administration establishes HACCP (Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Point) to emphasize on the importance of sanitation in the food business. The main application of HACCP is that it implements seven practical principles that would guarantee food safety in any restaurants in the United States (Arduser and Brown 2005). Keeping good sanitation involves having the tables, chairs, spoons, plates and cups clean. And the restaurant is always dusting every corner to get rid of bacteria and viruses that often attached themselves to filthy spots. Once the environment of the restaurant is clean, the food will definitely be clean and the customers would be happy to be eating healthily. Risk assessment in practice For risk assessment to be successfully carried out in a restaurant, the management should set up a risk assessment team, which can comprise of the risk managers/supervisors, cooks, cook assistants, waiters and waitresses and the all cleaners. This organization is essential because these members of staff are those directly in contact with the foodstuffs, condiments, drinks and the customers. HACCP method of risk assessment may be employed by any restaurateur to fully understand the extent of the risks facing his/her business. HACCP operates using the seven principles outlined below (Arduser and Brown, 2005) (i) Analysis of hazards: It is the duty of the risk assessment team in a restaurant to analyze all hazards that are related to their activities. Take for example: cooks can detect when contaminated condiments have been used to prepare soup or when expired or spilt foodstuff was used to make some foods. The servers could immediately detect bad drinks from their smell or identify bad food through its color and smell, too. The risk assessment team needs to work together and exchange information freely among one another. Unhindered communication would encourage each staff to come forward when he/she discovers some hazards. (ii) Identification of critical control points: These critical control points could be discovered in food’s production-from its raw state to the final stage. (iii) Establishing preventive measures with critical limits for each control point: Once the critical points at which hazards occurred have been known, it is possible to establish preventive measures with critical limits for each control point. This will make it possible for the hazards to be prevented in the course of cooking or serving. (iv) Establishing procedures to monitor the critical control points: For example, it is possible for cooks to know when food turned bad, or for a server to detect when bad drink is on the table. Therefore, the restaurant’s risk assessment team could establish procedures that would monitor the critical control points. (v) Establishing the corrective measures: Once the food and health hazards have been identified, the risk assessment team could establish corrective measures to do away with the hazards (Corlett, 1998) (vi) Establishing procedures to verify that the system is working properly: This step is very important in the sense that it guarantees continuous quality control system at the restaurant (Stevenson and Food Processor Institute 1993) (vii) Establishing effective record keeping: It is advisable that the records and data arose from the above-listed processes should kept for future manipulation, as a reference to understand the extent of damage and how to prevent such hazards from affecting the same restaurant in the future (Mortimore and Wallace, 1998) 　　　　　　　　Risk Control Measures At the moment, restaurants also engage in some risk control measures; in other words, they engage in quality control strategies. Some of these strategies include setting up inexpensive but efficient testing mechanisms. They test every foodstuff, condiment and material that is used in the kitchen. And once the quality of the food materials have been confirmed, the restaurant’s workers are then confident that they are providing good foods to the customers. For servers, some of them are sent on several trainings that include wine tasting, personal and food hygiene seminars. Once the waiters and waitresses have the true knowledge of the danger at stake if they don’t keep to hygiene regulations, they would do everything in their power to keep clean, and serve only good food and drinks to their customers. 　　　　　The restaurant could adopt general food quality control measures that are available through the local health authorities. Conclusion After the analysis of hazards and other risks associated with operating restaurants, the owner of this business and the workers could understand their obligation to serve the public nothing but healthy foods. Good food, as people say, brings good health. References 1. Cannon, H and Tarcy, B 2001, The Complete Idiots Guide to Starting Your Own Restaurant, Alpha Books, New York. 2. Magat, WA and Viscusi, WK 1992, Informational Approaches to Regulation, MIT Press, Cambridge, MA. 3. Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations 2006, Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), Rome, viewed on November 27, 2008, 4. Lawson, Fred 1994, Restaurants, Clubs & Bars: Planning, Design and Investment for Food Service Facilities, Architectural Press, New York. 5. Stellman, JM and International Labor Office 1998, Encyclopaedia of Occupational Health and Safety, Fourth Edition, International Labor Organization, Geneva, Switzerland. 6. Sugarman, SD and Rabin, RL 1993, Smoking Policy: Law, Politics, and Culture, Oxford University Press US, New York. 7. Arduser, L and Brown DR 2005, HACCP & Sanitation in Restaurants and Food Service Operations: A Practical Guide Based on the FDA Food Code, with Companion CD-ROM, Atlantic Publishing Company, Ocala, FL. 8. Stevenson, KE and Food Processor Institute 1993, HACCP: establishing hazard analysis critical control point programs: a workshop manual, Food Processors Institute, New York. 9. Mortimore, S and Wallace, C 1998, HACCP: A Practical Approach, Springer, New York. 10. Corlett, DA 1998, HACCP Users Manual, Springer, New York. Read More