Performance assessment of food safety management system in the pork slaughter plants of China

•Develop an instrument for measuring the effectiveness of the FSMS system.•The survey data were collected from 60 food companies in whole China.•Announced and unannounced assessment methodology was used.•Weak points and factors of FSMS implementation were analysed.

The aim of this study was to investigate the status of food safety management system (FSMS) implemented at the pork slaughter plants in China, based on a detailed profile of both announced assessments carried out in 60 companies and unannounced assessments in 25 ones, with the checklist covered 29 indicators. The results from the study indicated several factors had an effect on the status of FSMS, associated with company size, location, target market, and valid certificates. The results also revealed a weakness of FSMS on good manufacture practices, including contamination control, pest control, clean and disinfection, facility environment and personal hygiene. In order to precisely measure implementation performance and better identify insufficiency, unannounced assessment was shown to be more efficient than announced assessment.