Quality assurance and food safety are critical for all businesses that store, serve and otherwise handle food before it reaches customers. Testo provides modern solutions to benefit business. This article first appeared in the July 2021 issue of Food and Drink Business.
Managing these foundational processes for safe and healthy operations can involve a significant investment and time. Traditional workflows for overseeing food safety and quality management throughout a supply chain require plenty of active human involvement.
Investing in a modern food safety and quality management solution that emphasises automation and streamlined delivery of data can alleviate operational concerns and help your organisation operate more effectively in terms of environmental regulation adherence, energy savings improvement and general process modernisation. It can also minimise risk and wastage.
Consider these three reasons to invest in a food safety and quality management solution.
1.) Food safety and the law
The Food Act: This law requires food business owners to make sure that food they sell or prepare for sale is safe to eat. It sets standards of cleanliness for food storage, preparation and service areas, and hygienic food handling practices. Each state has its own Food Act.
Australia New Zealand Food Standards Code: This code contains detailed requirements for food businesses to operate safely, including how to keep food safe to eat. It is the basis for the Food Act in each state. Your workplace will have procedures to make sure you follow this code at work. You can find more information at the Food Standards Australia and New Zealand (FSANZ) website.
Food businesses must have a food safety program, which shows their food safety and hygiene practices and procedures. In most states this program must be written, but in some states the business must notify the government department of their food safety activities. The program usually requires businesses to record information such as food delivery times, food storage temperatures and cleaning schedules and this is where testo solutions come to the rescue.
2.) Improving product safety
Food safety is a core concern for consumers and companies alike. If your operation must keep ingredients and food at a safe temperature before it reaches the customer, strong oversight and consistency are vital. Manual monitoring can easily allow human error to creep into the process as well as create blind spots that can result in spoiled or otherwise unsafe food.
With a modern quality assurance and food safety solution in place, it's far easier to keep food at a safe temperature and build a positive reputation among your customers.
3.) Lowering operational costs
The time spent checking and logging temperatures to reconcile reports and conduct data analysis can quickly add up. While it would be an understandable allocation of resources if more efficient alternatives didn’t exist, that’s simply no longer the case. Businesses have powerful options for maintaining key standards through an automated food safety and quality management solution while also reducing the amount of time people have to spend on rote work.
Freeing up employees allows them to focus on tasks that better leverage their knowledge, skills, and experience, which is better value to the company. That includes reviewing the information and analysis provided by a modern food safety and quality management solution, and taking proactive steps to address issues and act on opportunities for additional efficiency and cost savings.
Partnering with an industry leader
At Testo, we offer a food safety and quality management solution that aligns with the needs of supermarkets, restaurants and hospitals, aged care and childcare facilities, and other businesses in the food distribution, logistics and sales space. Get in touch with our team to learn more about the testo Saveris range, which accounts for every step of the temperature measuring process.
