Food Safety Policy

Since 1948, Rifai has remained faithful to its tradition of providing authentic experience for its customers. From humble beginnings on Mazraa street in Beirut, offering home-roasted nuts and kernels to the Lebanese, Rifai elevated the snacking experience to become an iconic symbol of Lebanese culture, pride, and know-how.

Throughout the years, the brand established itself as an industry leader with a legacy built on quality, taste, innovation, and a commitment to promote the best of what Lebanon has to offer. Rifai’s extensive catalogue of locally produced products provides a variety of flavors for all occasions and lifestyles. Its state-of-the-art factory works tirelessly to create a wide selection of products that take the snacking experience to the next level.

In 2021, MERIT, the holding company of the Saadé family and CMA CGM Group, completed the acquisition of Rifai in a bid to accelerate the brand’s growth and offer a piece of Lebanon to consumers all around the globe.

The Vision

Our ambition at Rifai is clear and simple, to build a global brand and provide a platform to export our Lebanese know-how. Rifai aims to:

• Become an internationally recognized brand name and a leading provider of delicious nuts and kernels in addition to coffee, sweets, and confectionary in the local, international retail and sales markets, and enjoy market share leadership wherever it exists.
• Always supply safe products in line with applicable statutory, regulatory and customers’ requirements related to food safety.

 

The Mission

RIFAI endeavors to secure and maintain:

• Unparalleled business know-how and loyalty to heritage.
• High Team Motivation.
• Continuous product innovation and production in line with highest food safety standards and requirements.
• Ongoing production improvement and development
• Strong commitment to RIFAI clients, its employees, the company, and the industry.

 

The Quality, Food Safety and Traceability Policy

RIFAI Roastery designs, produces, and packs a wide range of raw, roasted, fried and coated nut & kernels.

The raw materials are bought locally or imported from various suppliers, farmers, and brokers. RIFAI’s brand values and product quality are preserved and delivered through a well-established approved list of suppliers that have grown to understand the brand requirements. The company endeavors to procure the safest product of the highest quality at the lowest possible cost from a reliable source. The company has been diligently working on its supplier approval processes through a supplier evaluation based on standardized risk assessment.

The processing occurs in RIFAI’s premises using highest technologies with extra care in applying the implemented quality, food safety and traceability standards and procedures. The end products are distributed locally and exported. In the local market, RIFAI’s products are distributed to all RIFAI branches and to different distributors. As for the export markets, RIFAI has various clients all over the world: Europe, Australia, America, Africa, Asia always in compliance with the international regulations and standards.

RIFAI, represented by its top management, is fully committed to provide products that are safe and of excellent quality. We devote ourselves to applying safety and quality control standards in line with Food Safety & Traceability Management Systems to satisfy our customers, our society, and our environment.

To achieve the above, the company endeavors to:

·         Establish and set objectives for its quality, food safety and traceability management system and monitor them periodically for continuous improvement.

• Satisfy the requirements of applicable food safety requirements and guidelines including statutory and regulatory requirements such as ISO 22000:2018 and FSSC 22000, international and local legal requirements and mutually agreed customer requirements related to food safety.

·         Implement and maintain effective arrangements for communication externally and internally as it is relevant to its food safety management system.

·         Commit to continual improvement of its food safety management system.

·         Ensure the competencies of all its members in relation to quality and food safety.

·         Commit through top management to ensure that good quality and food safety culture is adopted by all people throughout all levels of the organization and that continuous training and mentoring of staff, especially those working directly with the product, take place. All staff in the organization and suppliers are expected to adopt Rifai’s quality and food safety culture.

• Apply and optimize a traceability system to improve appropriate use and reliability of information, effectiveness and productivity.
• Work at reducing the relevant non-conformities and applying a firm traceability system to avoid their potential risks in withdrawing or recalling the products if needed.
• Emphasize the importance of maintaining a safe and hygienic work environment inside the production facility and point of sales.
• Ensuring safe food from production to consumption through risk assessments, hazard analysis management and communications.
• Research and develop products in line with customers’ trends, lifestyles, and needs.
• Maintaining customer satisfaction and protecting consumer health through the consistent delivery of safe products

 

The Code of Conduct

RIFAI abides by laws and humanitarian practices in all its actions. All our trading partners from suppliers, contractors and clients must comply with the rules, systems, and local and national regulations, especially those related to factories and workers as applicable in the region where their activities are conducted.

RIFAI follows the listed standards below:

·         Employment practices: fair treatment of employees is a must. All employees work voluntarily without coercion or at risk of physical harm. They are to be compensated with the proper salary without being exploited in any way.

·         Wages and benefits: wages and benefits specified by the law are to be respected.

·         Child labor: child labor is strictly forbidden. RIFAI refuses to deal with trading partners who hire or allow child labor in any of their activities.

·         Discrimination: RIFAI chooses its employees depending on their skills and competencies and not based on their gender, age, disability, physical tendencies, social advantages, religious and cultural beliefs...

·         Women’s rights: working women will be treated equally in all employment matters.

·         Health and Safety: Employees are to be provided with a healthy, safe, and clean working environment designed to prevent work injuries and damage.

Detailed principles are listed in RIFAI’s Code of Conduct.

Deputy General Manager

 

 

As a socially and environmentally responsible group, RIFAI always incorporates environmental objectives to be achieved in the company policy and develops an environmental action plan for implementing them. The group, in each decision, takes into consideration issues that affect the environment and efficiently works on a planning/implementation process to achieve these goals.

 

RIFAI works on identifying, assessing, and subsequently managing its environmental responsibilities. The environmental impact of production and processing is reduced through the following actions:

·         The No-Use policy of non-renewable resources.

·         No Use of hazardous materials (e.g. metals, chemicals) and no generation of toxic waste.

·         Monitoring, recording and reduction of generated packaging waste.

·         Recycling of used frying oil by providing it to a biodiesel processing facility.

·         Reducing use of utilities (water; energy), mainly achieved through the reduction of working hours.

·         Eliminating packaging where possible (display boxes; increase number of pack/boxes for export)

·         Use reusable, returnable containers vs. one use disposal ones for the distribution of bulk nuts in the branches.

·         Minimizing fuel usage and emissions to air by optimizing transport’s routing of the internal distribution fleet.

The group looks at the environmental aspect of its operations seriously. The production of nuts and kernels in general is rather mild and environmentally friendly. It doesn't generate any toxic waste or any substance that is harmful to the environment. We use fossil fuel to generate heat used in the production process and avoid releasing grease into the ground. 

 

Many steps have been considered in RIFAI’s facility to make the process as friendly as possible:

·         Consider natural light as much as possible to avoid using neon light and hence reduce electricity bill.

·         The production floor has been placed at the top floor to maximize it.  

·         The air conditioning is kept at minimal use, and many pressurized zones are kept under control to avoid heat dissipation and loss of energy. 

·         Most secondary packaging is recycled such as carton boxes and plastic bags.

·         Used oil will be sold to recycling companies to produce biodiesel.

·         The sewage has been equipped with an oil separator to collect any oil before going to septic tanks. Many small details have been considered to minimize the impact on the environment. 

·         Installation of solar panel system to reduce and control energy consumption.

·         Implementation of a recycling program of waste in the scope of a sustainability project.

 

In addition, RIFAI is socially responsible towards society, especially its employees. Many health and safety considerations have been implemented in its sites (periodic trainings, fire safety and emergency preparedness plans…) to avoid any hazard on the staff.

 

 

Deputy General Manager

 

Tania Ezzedine