Authored by Joanna Trafialek
Food Safety
Food safety is the most important quality feature for
consumers, hence food law regulates this issue in details assuring
food the consumer buys meets its safety expectations. According
to the Codex Alimentarius Commission (CAC) [1], food safety is
the assurance that food will not cause harm to the consumer when
it is prepared and/or eaten according to its intended use. Food
safety is very important for consumers and producers as well. All
food producers are responsible for ensuring food safety. Therfore,
they should pay attention to the quality of raw materials use in a
production proces.
Suppliers play a significant role in food industry sectors. The
quality of the final product is determined by many factors: one of
the most important tools to ensure high quality of raw materials is
suppliers qualifications list. Ensuring that incoming raw materials
are free from hazards is the most effective way of keeping dangers
away from the food and the manufacturing facility. An adopted
approach to food safety should cover the entire supply chain,
starting with suppliers. Selecting suppliers is one of the most
important activities in supply chain management.
Selecting Suppliers
Each food plant should follow strict procurement processes
to ensure selecting safe, high quality raw materials. This includes
defining specifications for the materials, and performing checks
to ensure they always comply with the regulations. If they don’t
comply, they should be rejected.The choice of suppliers is a very important management process
in food business requiring well-structured operational procedures.
Generally, there are two methods of choosing suppliers: 1.” single
sourcing” – one supplier can meet all the needs of the purchaser and
2. “multiple sourcing” where in order to decrease the risk of nonavailability
of raw material, the purchaser buys raw materials from
several suppliers [2]. Cooperating with correct suppliers decreases
the costs and improves competitiveness [3] so purchasing strategy
is a critical activity for each food company [4]. Choosing a supplier
that can deliver a safe product should be the crucial objective of
food plant.
Methods for Assessing Suppliers
There are few methods for selecting and monitoring suppliers.
A good review of methods supporting supplier selection is
represented by Aissaoui et.al [5] and Ho et.al [6]. Various methods
to assess suppliers are presented in number of studies. For example,
Ghodsypour and O’Brien [7] used the fuzzy analytic hierarchy
process “FAHP” to choose the supplier, assessing the following
criteria: costs, quality, supplier’s profile and risk factors. Amid et
al. [2] used the fuzzy goal programming “FGP” in order to set the
appropriate quantity of orders placed with particular suppliers
taking into account the lowest prices and the highest quality.
Laeequddin et al. [8] developed a trust building model through risk
evaluation in supply chain and data were analyzed using multiple
regression analyses. However, the above-mentioned methods are
not well known in food industry, neither are they very common in
small and medium size companies in the European Union.
There is a lack of a simple method of assessing suppliers in food
business. Trafiałek et al. [9] proposed a useful method of assessing
the risk of negative effect of a given supplier on the quality and
safety
of finished food products. Risk assessment is based on six criteria
for each supplier: the type of commodities or products provided by
the supplier, the period of cooperation with the supplier, systems
used by the supplier to guarantee food quality, safety and reliability
of services, and past performance with respect to delayed deliveries,
cancelled deliveries and deliveries against which complaints were filed
due to insufficient quantity of raw materials. The method
can be used in small companies and does not require complicated
calculations or advanced statistical techniques. Thus, it could be
very helpful for small businesses yet has same limitations, e.g. the
knowledge and awareness of employees.
Therefore, for the smallest food business operators it is
recommended to consider the following steps when selecting and
keeping suppliers. The first one is determining what type of food
safety systems a given supplier has in place. According to EU law,
Good Hygienic Practice and HACCP system are mandatory. The
second step is finding out whether they receive raw materials
from selected and reliable sources. The next one is to conduct an
inspection of the supplier’s facility before starting cooperation
with them. All suppliers have to meet hygienic requirements and
it should be checked on place. This is especially important if they
supply high-risk raw materials or if there are doubts about their
food safety systems. It is recommended to inspect the supplier
from time to time and find out what kind of food safety training
the supplier provides to its employees. The condition of a supplier’s
delivery trucks and equipment must be examined on each delivery.
To maintain an expected level of quality of a delivery, the products
being supplied should be monitored to make sure that the supplier
consistently provides the expected products. It is essential to
monitor the cooperation effectively with a given supplier as well as
the quality of the raw materials delivered.
Nowadays, there are numerous food standards and
specifications to which food producer and entrepreneurs must
refer, however, they rarely have the knowledge to assess the
suppliers [10].
Summary
In the summery, the authors wont draw attention to proper
cooperation with suppliers and the need for selecting them
carefully. This is because it is substantial to guarantee safety of
products and right quality of raw materials.
To read more about this article...Open access Journal of Nutrition & Food Science
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