The Food Safety Authority of Ireland (FSAI) today launched its new website, http://www.fsai.ie/, which is a comprehensive source of information for food businesses on every aspect of food safety, food hygiene management and food legislation.
The FSAI website which received over 180,000 hits in 2008, representing a 58% increase on 2007, has a wide range of new features and improved navigation tools to help people access information quickly. They include an online complaint function and an automated subscription service.The newly enhanced FSAI site now also has a dedicated ‘food businesses’ section which provides guidelines on starting a new food business; topics of interest and information and access to food-handling training procedures and materials. The ‘food businesses’ section also provides information on HACCP (Hazard Analysis & Critical Control Point), a legal requirement with which all food businesses must comply. Also, of interest for food businesses is the ‘legislation’ section which provides links to all the Irish and international food acts and legislation.
The homepage of the website has both a ‘feedback form’ and ‘make a complaint’ functionality, which enables the FSAI to participate in two-way interaction with users and obtain feedback from stakeholders who are observing and working in the field. All information submitted via the website is investigated and where necessary, acted upon immediately.
According to Ms Edel Conway, Information Manager, FSAI, the objective of the website is to assist food businesses to source a wide range of information quickly. "The website is of vital importance to food businesses, as it provides information and advice on a broad range of food safety issues, such as food safety training, HACCP, business start-up and legislation requirements. It is updated and monitored on a daily basis and is designed to provide users with all the information they need in relation to food safety in a quick and efficient manner. Last year, 71% of visits to our website were from Ireland, but we also had visits from the UK (10%), US (4%) and France, Germany, Canada, Netherlands and Belgium (1% each)", she commented.
http://www.fsai.ie/ is structured to provide reliable data on the core areas of importance which include food legislation and consultations; monitoring and enforcement; science and health; food businesses and resources/publications.
Alternatively, those working in the food industry with comments or queries can contact the FSAI advice line on 1890 336677.
New additions to the FSAI website include:
- A re-developed, standards-compliant website based on analysis of user behaviour
- Improvements in usability, accessibility, site architecture, navigation and design
- Automated subscriptions
- Polling facility
- Quick links from home page
- Publications - Search by type/topic
- RSS Feeds
