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Food Safety Certification System

What is the "TOKYO FOOD HYGIENE MEISTER" System?

　This is a system to certify food facilities that proactively work on hygiene management for providing safe food. This system is based on the Certification System for In-House Management of Food Hygiene and it was established in 2003. Tokyo Metropolitan Government (hereinafter, “TMG”)certifies such facilities as Tokyo Food Hygiene Meisters.

The Meister system assesses and visualizes the hygiene management operated by food businesses, to prevent health hazard resulting from eating and drinking. This aims to improve the hygiene management level of food businesses overall, and provide safer foods to consumers.

• Leaflet link

MEISTER sticker that obtained MEISTER certification

（English）	（Japanese）

• Leaflet link(Mark)
  

How to become a "Tokyo Food Hygiene Meister"

In this system, a certification body designated by TMG inspects and certifies the food business, regarding voluntary health management based on the principle of HACCP *1.

　A food business operator who wants to receive the certification creates a hygiene management manual in which it establishes its own hygiene management methods and frequency, etc., according to the facility’s size and food handled, regarding the certification standards written below *2. It then attaches that manual to an application it sends to a certification body *3, which is a third party institution designated by TMG.

The certification body that received the application firstly inspects whether the manual’s hygiene management methods meet the certification standards established by TMG. If it passes this inspection, the certification inspection body visits the applicant’s food handling facility, and inspects whether its hygiene management is being done according to the manual. A facility that passes these 2 inspections is certified as a TOKYO FOOD HYGIENE MEISTER (hereinafter, “MEISTER”).

*1  HACCP(Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Point): A system of hygiene management for food, developed in the 1960s in the United States to ensure the safety of space food. To prevent the occurrence of health damage,it addresses food safety through the analysis and proper management of health hazards in the handling of food by food businesses,and requires continued monitoring and record-taking with regard to particularly important processes.

*2 Certification Standards: These are based on the “Guidelines on Management and Operation Standards that Food Business Operators should Implement” of Japan’s Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare.  These guidelines are based on the “Code of Practice: General Principles of Food Hygiene (CAC/RCP 1-1969)” shown by the Codex Alimentarius Commission (CAC).

1. Hygiene management of facilities and equipment,
2. Hygiene management of machines and tools,
3. Hygienic handling of food, etc.,
4. Hygiene management of water,
5. Hygiene management of wastewater and waste matter,
6. Extermination of rats and insects,
7. Hygiene training of staff,
8. Hygiene management of staff,
9. Responses when accidents occur, etc.

How can consumers find "Tokyo Food Hygiene Meister"?

There are a wide variety of MEISTERs. Such as restaurants, cafeterias, schools, companies,hospitals,nursery schools, welfare facilities for the aged, milk delivery, supermarkets and manufacturing facilities.

TMG publishes information about certified facilities on its website, so you can search for them.

Also, a MEISTER sticker is at the entrance, near the cash register, on the menu, etc. of restaurants, cafeterias, food sales shops etc. that obtained MEISTER certification. So you can check for it.

When buying food, the TOKYO FOOD HYGIENE MEISTER mark is on the package of food made by a food manufacturer that obtained MEISTER certification.

Numbers of Certified Facilities

As of Aug 10 2024　

Tokyo Food Safety Information Center

Tokyo Metropolitan Government initiatives and systems