2025-04-07
Imported sesame-based products, including sesame seeds, tahini, and halva, have been implicated in numerous food recalls in Canada due to contamination with Salmonella.
This notice includes steps you can take to meet the food safety regulatory requirements that apply to your business and reduce the risk of Salmonella in imported sesame products.
Background
Salmonella can cause serious illness or death.
- Salmonellosis outbreaks have occurred in Canada and many other countries due to people consuming sesame-based products contaminated with Salmonella.
- While most people recover completely, some cases lead to hospitalization and death.
Salmonella contamination in food products can lead to recalls.
- Salmonella in sesame-based products has been found to occur frequently in Canada and in many other parts of the world.
- Between 2017 and 2024, there were 41 recalls for sesame-based products in Canada due to the presence of Salmonella. Imported sesame seeds, tahini, and halva, as well as tahini produced in Canada from imported sesame seeds, have been implicated.
Your obligations as an importer
As a Safe Food for Canadians licence holder, you are responsible for ensuring that the food you import is safe and meets Canadian requirements.
Importers of sesame products must ensure that food products imported are not contaminated with Salmonella.
Under the Safe Food for Canadians Regulations (SFCR), importers are required to source from foreign suppliers who manufacture, prepare, store, package and label food under conditions that provide at least the same level of protection as the preventive measures outlined in the regulations. To achieve that, you must take these steps:
- Develop and implement preventive controls that demonstrate how you control the microbiological, physical, and chemical hazards associated with the foods you import. Food businesses should document their food safety controls in a preventive control plan (PCP).
- Salmonella must be identified in the PCP as a microbiological hazard to be controlled in sesame-based products.
- Demonstrate that your foreign supplier has a food safety system in place and has implemented appropriate measures to control Salmonella in the sesame-based products they produce and supply to you. You can look for:
- good agricultural practices are used by sesame growers to control the presence of birds and animals in fields
- potable water is used for irrigation and to remove sesame hulls
- soaking time is controlled to minimize the potential for Salmonella growth
- a validated heat treatment is used to roast sesame seeds which is a critical step in controlling Salmonella in sesame products
- the potential for cross-contamination after heat treatment of sesame seeds is minimized by using effective sanitation procedures, employee hygiene and handling practices
- Document evidence that your foreign supplier(s) are taking measures to eliminate Salmonella from sesame products. Document how you select suppliers that:
- are certified and listed by a foreign competent authority as eligible exporters, if available
- implement food safety programs that are based on Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Point and are internationally recognized
- can provide documented evidence that the food they supply to you meets Canadian requirements
- can provide certificates of analysis to you based on regular sampling and testing of their products using an accredited lab, such as ISO 17025 which shows the product is free from Salmonella
- are willing to establish a formal agreement with you that helps ensure their products meet Canadian food safety requirements
- Keep complete and accurate traceability records that show who you received the food from and who it was sent to.
- Record and investigate complaints, including those related to sesame-based products, and take immediate action if illness or injury is reported.
- Notify the Canadian Food Inspection Agency (CFIA) and initiate a recall if you become aware that food products in distribution contain Salmonella.
Guidance
To help you develop, implement and maintain preventive controls or a PCP, the CFIA has prepared the following guidance documents:
- Food safety for industry
- Regulatory requirements: Preventive controls and preventive control plan
- The importer guide: prepare your preventive control plan
- Preventive control plan exemption for small food businesses
- Having a Supplier Food Safety Assurance Program can help ensure that the products and ingredients you receive or import are safe and suitable
Inspection and enforcement
The CFIA continues to conduct inspection activities to verify that preventive controls are effective and up-to-date, and that they are being implemented. If you don't meet all federal requirements, you could be subject to control measures like seizure or recall of your products, and/or enforcement actions, such as administrative monetary penalties, licence suspension or cancellation, or prosecution.
Questions
For more information, visit our Toolkit for food businesses. If you are unable to find answers to your questions, you can contact CFIA online.