Starter Kit. Idea 157 of 500. Cluster 7
Quality certification and food safety advisory
The mechanism, from the book
The tiny business pathway. A rural woman with an exceptional product should not need photography, English copy, packaging design and a distributor before the world can find her.
The first step
Visit five small food producers near you and walk through each kitchen against the checklist of a recognised international food-safety scheme, free, then give each a written list of what would fail an inspection. Ask which of them has a buyer waiting on certification. Offer that producer a fixed-fee package to fix the list and prepare for the audit. Their signed agreement is your first client.
- Who pays first
- A producer with a supermarket or importer interested in their product, who needs certification before the first order.
- What leaves today
- Food that cannot show certification can only be sold raw or locally; the certificate is the proof that lets it leave finished.
Ask first
- Sri Lanka Standards Institution. Ask which certifications small food producers most often need and how they are issued.
- the area Medical Officer of Health. Ask what hygiene checks small food producers most often fail.
Check before you spend
Which qualifications an adviser needs to be credible, and that you never promise a certificate only the certifying body can grant.
Find out these three numbers
- What will a producer pay for help getting certified?
- How many producers fail buyer checks today?
- How long does certification usually take?
A comparison from the book
Japan. Chapter Eleven
"The Sri Lankan version is a Ceylon mark that means something because an inspector will not let a bad batch carry it"
A mark means something only when an inspector refuses a bad batch.
The test
Does it keep value that now leaves the island, or build the proof that lets somebody else do so?
From the appendix of Why Not Sri Lanka? by Dr Maheshika Halbeisen. The idea and the mechanism are the book's; this kit was written for the site.