Managing Food and Water Safety in the Oil & Gas Industry

Abstract

The World Health Organization (WHO) reports a rising incidence of food- and water-related illnesses in both developed and developing countries. According to recent data, unsafe food and water is implicated in three million deaths per year and 2.4 billion episodes of illness. It is known that food and waterborne diseases are a major contributor to the global disease burden and as such, have a large potential health and economic impact on oil and gas projects and operations, from frontier E&P locations through the supply chain to retail operations. In view of the health risks to project personnel and the public, we found there to be a clear need for modern industry guidelines and training on the prevention and mitigation of food and waterborne diseases. This paper therefore highlights the recently published Food & Water Safety guideline for the Oil & Gas Industry. This guideline document has been prepared by the joint Health Committee of the Oil and Gas Producers Association (OGP) and the International Petroleum Industry Environmental Conservation Association (IPIECA) in response to the above concerns, and has drawn on the competence of representatives from a number of member companies, including BP, ENI, Nexen, and Statoil. There is an emerging international consensus on the key principles and practices for organising and implementing effective and sustainable food and water management programmes and the two building blocks cited are the Hazard Analysis Critical Control Point (HACCP) system and the generic Food Safety Management System (FSMS) developed under the 2005 International Organization for Standardization (ISO) 2200 standard. Water safety management systems have been the subject of numerous World Health Organization (WHO) guidance documents. The 2001 WHO document, "Water Quality: Guidelines, Standards and Health: Assessment of risk and risk management for water-related infectious disease" also embraces the key HACCP principles as one of the most effective strategies for managing water-related disease risks. Therefore, from a management perspective, there is a strong overlap and commonality between food and water safety management approaches, particularly in their use of HACCP. The new guide is an evidence-based reference aimed at corporate and project-level HSE managers, operations managers, company physicians, clinic medical staff, occupational health and hygiene supervisors and company, as well as contractor and franchise retail site managers and staff, and contains generic programme templates, checklists, audit protocols, layperson guidance documents, web-based resources and evidence-based technical and scientific articles, achieved through a combination of CD – based interactive material and conventional text. While the main focus of the guide is on microbial contamination, in many parts of the world chemical and physical contamination is potentially as serious a problem. For this reason, the technical focus of the guide is on the broad impacts and control of microbial, chemical and physical contamination of food and water systems.