Presentation description:

Defining and developing food-safety and food-quality systems have become increasingly formalized since HACCP methods were first instituted in the 1960s. Safety and quality requirements are now more complex and require sophisticated risk analysis and data analytics reporting. This demands an informed, three part process involving prerequisite programs, customer requirements and enabling risk assessment and management support systems.

Integrated management systems are the enabling technology to achieve these goals and meet standards. Monitoring quality and safety parameters combined with SPC and manufacturing analytics and reporting provides feedback loops to suppliers and for developing process capability based specifications. Well designed systems deliver role appropriate reporting and data consolidation to give each individual what is required to make correct decisions and avoid "drowning in data and paralysis by analysis." CAPA (Corrective Action/Preventative Action) systems provide enterprise and management level visibility of problems and their resolution. These capabilities increase the probability of successful safety and quality management.

Phil Schreiber and George Yost participated in the 10th annual Rockwell Automation Market Business Overview (RAMBO). The conference focused on collaborative innovation for growth through Rockwell Automation’s network – Rockwell Automation, Solution Providers and Encompass Partners.

As a Rockwell Automation Encompass Partner, RAMBO provides a means for Northwest Analytical to further understand how these resources can be aligned to bring quality solutions to meet our customer needs. In addition to the general sessions, Phil and George participated in the Food and Beverage and the Life Sciences breakout sessions.

Jeff Cawley and Dr. John Surak presented the symposium, “Guarantee Your Success, Don’t Just Document Failure”, How to use SPC to manage your supply chain to maximize food safety, quality and profit while reducing risk.

From ground beef to spinach, we have seen the huge downside of supply chain safety and quality failures. Food processors are faced with the continuing challenges of maximizing food safety while reducing production costs by improving throughput, product yields, and process efficiencies. One effective strategy is to improve the performance of the supply chain.

Many customers now mandate their suppliers implement Statistical Process Control (SPC) programs. These programs provide the results of improved food quality and safety while decreasing purchasing costs. Suppliers and customers will not see financial benefits from SPC implementation, if the suppliers feel that all they are required to do is to ship control charts and histograms with the raw product. However, all members of the supply chain can receive large financial and risk reduction benefits if the suppliers actively embrace SPC.

The session examined how simple SPC tools provide the means to develop a detailed understanding of process performance. Case studies demonstrate the role of SPC and Process Capability Analysis to select and certify vendors, monitor lot acceptance and improve food safety performance.

The presentation demonstrated how the integration of Quality Analyst and Exaquantum can create a system that combines real-time predictive analytics with comprehensive analysis of historical data. The Cristal installation was presented as an example.

The symposium dealt with the issues of ISO 22000 and international supply chain quality and food safety management. All three members of the US delegation (Dr. John Surak, Rick Stiers, and Steven Wilson) to ISO 22000 spoke. The international standard ISO 22000 was a primary focus, examining the role of prerequisite programs as a basis for ensuring food safety and the application of ISO 22000 and 9001 to the USDC Seafood Inspection Program. In addition, Sid Jhaveri discussed how Starbucks Coffee manages their international supply chain and Jeffery Cawley of NWA spoke on how to implement a supply-chain-quality and food-safety information-management system that meets current ISA, SCOR and ISO standards. The individual papers were:

• John Surak, Clemson University, ‘Overview of ISO 22000 and international supply chain safety and quality management’
• Rick Stiers, Consulting Food Scientists, ‘Prerequisite programs as a basis for ensuring food safety’
• Steve Wilson, NOAA Fisheries Seafood Inspection Program, ‘Applying ISO 22000 and 9001 to food systems: USDC seafood inspection program as a case study’
• Sid Jhaveri, Starbucks Coffee Company, ‘A global perspective on the role of quality assurance in the supply chain’
• Jeffery Cawley, Northwest Analytical, ‘Implementing quality and food safety management systems’

Manufacturing systems now collect unprecedented quantities of process data. The investment made in these systems, when combined with pressures to reduce costs, increase yields, and meet regulatory and supply-chain requirements, is generating strong interest in the use of analytics to leverage the value of process data. In addition, process improvement programs such as Lean Manufacturing and Six Sigma have increased the demand for more effective data analysis capabilities. Current approaches to analyzing process data have typically been too simplistic to make critical decisions with confidence, or have required specialized knowledge that limits the number of practitioners. This paper describes different approaches to analyzing manufacturing data and identifies their strengths and weaknesses. Case studies from companies that have successfully applied analytics to process data on a broad scale are used to develop a model for building an effective Manufacturing Analytics capability. The model includes details on data connectivity and aggregation, choosing and applying statistical analysis techniques, the importance of role-based reporting, and managing the transition from a reactive to a predictive system.

HACCP violations are characterized by exceeding critical limits at a Control Point. Often, monitoring CCP values is treated as a go/no-go attribute. It has been demonstrated that using SPC to monitor the underlying process and guarantee a stable, highly capable process is the most effective method to avoid CCP violations. Preventative maintenance programs are designed to avoid process destabilization by scheduling maintenance ahead of expected failure. Such schedules are conservative, and can result in excessive maintenance episodes. By using SPC methods to monitor the process, one can move to an event driven preventative maintenance operation and achieve the same process stability at less cost and downtime.

Steve Olson, USDA Agricultural Marketing Service, reviews the National School Lunch program ground beef vendor certification and lot quality reporting system. He presents the results of the first two contract years which include higher quality and safer meat delivered to schools with greater control of value.