Many of the issues talked about in the FISHupdate Training Talk article are expanded upon here. The text below is a copy of the Training Talk article with hyperlinks embedded to more detailed articles. If you want to take a more direct route to these articles then follow these links.

• Seafood Training Centre North East - Academy partner profile
• Staff Motivation and Training - a new guide for employers
• Bivalve Purification Training - New programme piloted in October

TRAINING TALK NOVEMBER 2007

LAST MONTH was a busy month for Seafish, with Seafood Week, the launch of the Advanced Seafood Quality Assessment course, the Scottish pilot for a new short course for bivalve purification centres and the annual conference of the Association of Scottish Shellfish Growers (ASSG) in Oban. As usual, the ASSG conference was an intensive mix of interesting and highly informative presentations by experts from around the globe.  The Academy was represented at the ASSG Conference.

Seafood Training Centre - North East
One of the many Seafood Week activities held around the country was 'Ready Steady Fish' at North Shields. As well as demonstrations on cooking fish, the Seafood Training Centre's mobile unit took to the road with displays on how to fillet round fish. The event was helped by wonderful sunny weather and great interest was shown by young and old alike.
The centre is one of five Seafood Academy partners delivering training in food safety, health & safety, courses for the skippers ticket, sea survival and first aid and much more. More information can be found on their web site at www.seafoodtrainingcentre.co.uk.
The centre’s mobile training unit.

Staff Motivation and Training - A guide for employers

“Training has helped to make my team members feel both valued and appreciated, this motivation helped us to win a National Training Award in 2007”. Tracy Poskitt, Pride of Bridlington

Seafish is developing a motivation and training guide in collaboration with the National Federation of Fish Friers, the National Federation of Fishmongers, and the Eastern Group Training Association. The guide will assist owners of seafood micro businesses, including fish and chip shops and independent fishmongers, to motivate staff and offers techniques on how best to deliver in-house training. The guide will be available from April 2008 and more information can be found in the FishUpdate section of the Seafood Academy website at www.trainingacademy.org.

Bivalve Purification Training
Seafish is developing a number of training programmes to help the shellfish industry. Training courses for shellfish purification centres are essential for the health of the industry and, in recognition of this, Seafish has piloted a short course for purification centre staff and a longer course for centre managers is being finalised.

A half-day ‘Introduction to HACCP’ course for purification staff and a training course for purification centre inspectors have been specially developed and will be part of a comprehensive suite of training solutions for the industry.

The next step is to develop a network of trainers to deliver these courses in the UK. For more information on these courses, including course content please consult the Seafood Training Academy website at www.trainingacademy.org.

HACCP Training

Recent visits from Environmental Health Officers (EHOs) to seafood premises have resulted in an increased demand for HACCP training. EHOs have noted that HACCP systems are in place, but are not being used or updated, or are out of date. It has also been noted that many staff have no verifiable training in HACCP.

Through the Group Training Association (GTA) network and Academy partnership, Seafish provides a four hour, nationally-recognised, introductory course suitable for staff. Those with responsibility for managing and updating HACCP would require a Level 3 HACCP course, available from the CIEH, or a REHIS Intermediate HACCP course. These courses last several days and are best when the group is all from the same industry. Your local GTA or Seafood Academy partner will be able to arrange a course, so why not contact them? Seafish is also developing a short HACCP course for fishermen which will be available in early 2008.

For more information on the issues raised in this article, please log on to www.seafoodacademy.org and follow the link to FISHupdate.

And finally…
Congratulations to Keir Day and colleagues at Seafish and the GTA network for winning the 2007 Fishing News Safety Award for their fishing vessel stability training programme.