September 18, 2026
SQF Edition 10 Is Coming. Don’t Just Update Your System—Make It Better.
Why preparing for SQF Edition 10 is an opportunity to simplify your food safety system and make sure it works for your business
If your company is already SQF certified, Edition 10 may feel like another round of reviewing requirements, updating procedures, and getting ready for your next audit. But WMEP Consultant Peg Dorn recommends looking at the transition differently. Drawing on her experience with food safety certification and quality systems, Peg encourages food processors to use Edition 10 as an opportunity to do more than simply add the new requirements—to simplify and strengthen the food safety systems they already have.
SQF Edition 10 introduces new requirements, but it also gives food manufacturers a reason to step back and take a fresh look at the system they’ve been working with for years. Is it still effective? Has it become more complicated than it needs to be? Are there redundant procedures or documentation that no longer add value? The goal shouldn’t be simply to move from Edition 9 to Edition 10. It should be to come out of the transition with a better food safety system.
What’s Changing with SQF Edition 10?
SQF, or Safe Quality Food, is an international food safety standard widely used by food manufacturers in the United States. Companies currently certified to Edition 9 will need to transition to Edition 10 for their 2027 audits. Peg points to two areas food manufacturers should pay particular attention to: food safety culture and management of change.
Edition 10 places greater emphasis on food safety culture, including a risk assessment and KPIs. Peg advises manufacturers to choose measures that are meaningful, achievable, and beneficial to the business. Management of change also requires attention, including documentation around major changes. Peg cautions against making the process unnecessarily complicated. A system designed to manage change shouldn’t become so cumbersome that it slows the organization down.
Compliance Isn’t Enough. Your System Needs to Work.
One of Peg’s most important observations about Edition 10 is its focus on effectiveness. “Auditors aren’t just looking for procedures anymore,” Peg says. “They’re looking for evidence that the procedures work.” That distinction matters. Having a procedure documented is one thing. Having a system that people throughout the organization understand and consistently follow is another.
The increased focus on food safety culture reinforces that point. Food safety can’t reside only with the quality team or in a set of procedures. Employees throughout the organization need to understand their role in producing safe food.
Complexity Can Creep Into Your System Over Time
Companies that have maintained SQF certification for years may have added procedures, forms, documentation, and workarounds along the way. Each may have made sense at the time. But over the years, those additions can create redundancies and complexity that simply become part of how things are done. “When you live in a system for so long, you don’t always see the redundancies,” Peg says. “They just become normal.”
That’s what makes the transition to Edition 10 a good time to look at the entire system—not just the new requirements. What can be simplified? What needs to be strengthened? What no longer serves a purpose? And where has the system become harder to manage than it needs to be? Simplification isn’t about doing less to protect food safety. It’s about removing unnecessary complexity so the system is easier to understand, manage, and use effectively.
A Fresh Set of Eyes Can Help—even for Experienced SQF Manufacturers
The challenge, of course, is seeing problems in a system you work with every day. Experience with SQF doesn’t necessarily make those problems easier to spot.
A third-party assessment provides a fresh look across the entire system—procedures, documentation, employee practices, and the requirements of the standard—to identify gaps as well as opportunities to simplify.
A mock audit can take that preparation another step by testing the system through an auditor’s lens before the certification audit. For a manufacturer transitioning from Edition 9, the combination can help answer two important questions: Are we ready for Edition 10? And is our food safety system working as effectively as it could?
Bottom Line: Don’t Just Update Your SQF System. Make Sure It Works.
If you’re already certified to SQF Edition 9, don’t treat Edition 10 as a checklist of new requirements—use it as a reason to make the overall system better. Take a fresh look at what you have, simplify where you can, strengthen where you need to, and make sure the system is working as effectively as it should. Your next audit may be the deadline. But a food safety system that is simpler, understood across the organization, and effective every day is the bigger goal.