Provision of Consultancy Services for the Sea Fisheries Protection Authority

Tender description

The SFPA, as Official Agency under service contract with the FSAI, enforces the relevant seafood safety Regulations. The SFPA, as Competent Authority for the enforcement of seafood legislation carries out official controls on an ongoing basis in accordance with the relevant EU and National legislation from boat up to but excluding retail level. Official controls are carried out on fishing vessels; in shellfish production areas and in establishments handling preparing and processing seafood. The Health Service Executive has responsibility for official controls in the retail sector. The SFPA has a dedicated Food Safety Unit in Headquarters in Clonakilty and its primary function is to support and co-ordinate food safety regulation activities of the SFPA. To evaluate the reliability of the processes and procedures in place the following article from EC Regulation 882/2004 sets out the criteria to be achieved to ensure compliance: Article 8 of EC regulation No. 882/2004 Control and Verification Procedures 1. Competent Authorities shall carry out official controls in accordance with documented procedures. These procedures shall contain information and instructions for staff performing official controls, inter alia, the areas referred to in Annex II Chapter II. 2. Member States shall ensure that they have legal procedures in place in order to ensure that staff of the Competent Authorities has access to premises of and documentation kept by feed and food business operators so as to be able to accomplish their tasks properly. 3. Competent Authorities shall have procedures in place: (a) to verify the effectiveness of official controls that they carry out; and (b) to ensure that corrective action is taken when needed and that the documentation referred to in paragraph 1 is updated as appropriate. Please refer to the full RFT document for the full scope of works required under this contract.