In HACCP, a CCP is a step at which control measures are applied to prevent, eliminate, or reduce a food safety hazard to an acceptable level.

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A CCP is the point in the process where you apply a control measure that directly prevents, eliminates, or reduces a food safety hazard to an acceptable level. This means the action taken at that step has a real impact on safety, using a defined limit such as time, temperature, pH, or another critical parameter. For example, cooking food to a specific internal temperature is a CCP because failing to reach that temperature could allow pathogens to survive. Packaging integrity, labeling, and marketing don’t by themselves involve applying a hazard-control action at a specific step, so they aren’t describing a CCP. The key idea is that a CCP is where a concrete control action is used to reduce hazards to safe levels, with clear limits to guide the decision on whether the process is under control.