Confidence in the UK food chain was further enhanced today as steps were taken to enhance the food industry's arrangements for assuring the quality and safety of packaging materials of branded lines.

The United Kingdom Accreditation Service (UKAS) presented accreditation certificates to 11 organisations that play a key role in ensuring manufacturers meet these requirements, as set out in a standard published by the British Retail Consortium (BRC) and the Institute of Packaging (IOP).

Bill Moyes, director general of the BRC, commented: 'We are delighted that the work undertaken by the BRC, IOP and food and packaging manufacturers in developing the standard has resulted in a unique and influential scheme that benefits everybody involved.

'The standard allows retailers and manufacturers to purchase with confidence from certificated suppliers, knowing that safety systems and procedures are in pace that enhance due diligence.' He added: 'The BRC food technical standard has proved that product safety is not a competitive issue for the retail community and the cross co-operation that was evident during the development of the packaging standard will further augment product safety.' UKAS chief executive Linda Campbell welcomed the recipients and said: 'Once again UKAS accreditation is providing assurance of the impartiality, competence and sustained performance of the organisations in an essential area of the food industry. Since working with UKAS and the BRC to standardise the accreditation of food inspection agencies, it was natural for retailers to seek similar assurances of the competence of those bodies that examine food packaging production.' The IOP has praised the standard saying it simplifies the quality assurance of UK packaging suppliers and will enhance confidence in those players.

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