Chemical and Physical Hazards
What the exam tests
Chemical hazards from ingredients, cleaning, maintenance, and processing; physical hazards from materials and people; and controls that prevent, detect, or remove them.
Core rules
- Chemical: cleaning and sanitizing residues, lubricants, pesticides, veterinary drugs, heavy metals, mycotoxins, histamine, process-induced contaminants (acrylamide, furan, 3-MCPD, PAHs), and allergens.
- Physical: glass, hard plastic, metal, bone, stones, wood, personal items; control with prevention, detection (metal detection, X-ray), and removal (magnets, sieves, filters).
- Food-grade does not mean safe to eat; use approved food-contact lubricants and label all chemicals.
- Store chemicals separately, control dispensing, and verify rinse steps with conductivity or pH where appropriate.
- Process-induced hazards need recipe and process controls, not just end-product testing.
Worked example
A CIP caustic rinse is followed by a potable water flush. Conductivity at the final rinse is 15 µS/cm against a limit of 10. The line is re-rinsed and retested. If the limit is met, release; if not, investigate valve seating and flush volume. The hazard is chemical residue, severity moderate to high, likelihood controlled by verification.
Traps
Calling allergens biological; assuming food-grade lubricant is edible; ignoring mycotoxins in nuts and grains; using unapproved pesticides; treating glass as only a packaging issue.