Developing the Industry Standards…
We went through quite a process to establish a set of standards which are based on robust science and that were going to be achievable in your chip shop, restaurant pub or club. We thought there was no point having ‘fancy standards’ if you weren’t going to be able to use them every day. So we…
1. Did a literature search
We looked at all the scientific research from around the world to see what the latest and greatest scientists had discovered.
2. We did surveys in NZ so we knew exactly what was happening here.
We looked at the results from two surveys of New Zealand fast food outlets carried out in 1998 and 2007.
The 1998 survey (Morley-John et al, 2002; Morley-John et al, 2005) included interviews with operators, measurement of fryer temperature and observations of frying practices used by operators. The 2007 survey (unpublished) was carried out by mystery shoppers.Both surveys included laboratory analysis of chips from the outlets.
So after we had analyzed these we had a pretty good picture of what was going on.
3. We asked the industry
We asked a lot of people from supply and food service what would be a good ‘blueprint’ for going forward. In 2008 we were thrilled to get unanimous industry agreement for Industry Standards for Independent Fast Food Operators and another set for Hospitality /Food Service. In 2009 we were able to merge the Industry Standards and have one set that applies to the whole industry! This is what we have based all our online training on.
We are 100% confident that Industry Standards are scientifically robust and achievable for the entire industry!