Food inspection guidance: commodity inspection

Find operational guidance for the verification of a regulated party's product or thing against regulatory standards or requirements. This includes food and commodity-specific guidance for the analysis of a product or thing by inspection staff.

Common inspection guidance

The following guidance is common to all commodity inspection tasks as well as preventive control inspection and sample collection inspection tasks

• Standard inspection process
• Biosecurity for inspection activities
• Calibration procedures for common equipment used by the CFIA Inspectorate
• Electronic notes
• Sanitation and/or decontamination of mobile devices for routine operations
• Use of digital recording (camera, video, audio) devices during inspections

Commodity inspection

Basic label verification

• Basic food label verification

Container integrity verification

• Visual examination of container integrity

Grade verification

• Fish grade verification
• Honey grade verification
• Maple syrup grade verification
• Poultry carcass grade verification
• Shell egg grade verification
• Processed product grade verification
• Fresh fruit or vegetable grade verification

Ingredient verification

• Food ingredient verification

Net quantity verification

• Net quantity verification

Nutrient content and claims verification

• Nutrition labelling verification

Permission verification

• Permissions verification of Safe Food for Canadians licence

Commodity specific guidance

The following guidance is in the process of being updated to fully align with the new inspection architecture

Dairy and milk products

• Dairy product inspection

Eggs and egg products

• Processed egg product inspection

Meat and poultry products

• High line speed inspection system (HLIS) for beef – under development (refer to archived Meat hygiene manual of procedures, Chapter 17, Annex B)
• HACCP based slaughter inspection program (HIP) for Swine – under development (refer to archived Meat hygiene manual of procedures, Chapter 17, Annex C)
• Humane slaughter guidelines for mammalian food animals
• Poultry ante mortem inspection
• Poultry Traditional Inspection
• Poultry chilling and water retention
• Poultry: evisceration floor procedures other than post-mortem
• Humane care and handling of food animals
• Humane slaughter guidelines for avian food animals including ratites
• Post-mortem examination program
• Traditional poultry inspection presentation standards