Tag Archives: risk management

Guangtao Zhang, Ph.D., director of the Mars Global Food Safety Center

Complexity of Food Allergen Management Requires Global Collaboration

By Maria Fontanazza
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Guangtao Zhang, Ph.D., director of the Mars Global Food Safety Center

Undeclared allergens continue to be a big cause of food recalls. For allergen management practices to be effective within food companies, there must be a shared responsibility between food manufacturers, government agencies, regulators and consumers, says Guangtao Zhang, Ph.D., director of the Mars Global Food Safety Center. In a Q&A with Food Safety Tech, Zhang discussed key concerns related to undeclared allergens in food as well as the research that Mars is conducting to improve allergen management.

Food Safety Tech: The presence of undeclared allergens continues to be a hazard in the food safety space. Specific to peanut detection, what challenges is the industry facing?

Guangtao Zhang, Ph.D., director of the Mars Global Food Safety Center
Guangtao Zhang, Ph.D., director of the Mars Global Food Safety Center. All images courtesy of Mars.

Guangtao Zhang, Ph.D.: As food materials become more varied and complicated, food allergen management becomes increasingly complex. Robust, accurate and sensitive detection methods are essential to ensure consumer safety as well as compliance with regulatory standards for allergens in the food supply chain.

When you look at the regulatory aspects, detection methods go hand in hand. Firstly, there is a need to ensure that current standard detection methods used in regulatory control of consumer goods are validated for a range of complex food matrices to ensure neither over- nor under-estimation of allergen content occurs within a food supply chain. This is important because underestimation of allergen poses a significant food safety hazard to consumers, while overestimation of allergen can result in unnecessary product recalls, driving up product costs and food waste.

Secondly, validation and monitoring of the effectiveness of cleaning and handling practices in areas of potential cross contamination with allergen containing materials depend on reliable and robust quantitative food allergen test methods for their success. The more robust the testing protocols, the more we can improve our understanding of the risks associated with cross contamination of food allergens, potentially reducing the frequency of accidental contamination events.
It is also important to note that whilst the most common cause of undeclared allergen in the global food supply chain is through accidental contamination in raw materials or finished products, this is not the only method by which undeclared allergen may be found in a product.

For example, peanut flour may be used in economically motivated adulteration (EMA) food fraud cases. In 2018 the European Commission estimated that the cost of food fraud for the global food industry is approximately €30 billion every year. Due to its high protein content, peanut flour has been used as a bulking agent to raise the overall protein content of e.g., wheat flour, thus raising the ‘quality’, and therefore price, of lower value goods. The ability to effectively quantify peanut traces within complex products therefore has the potential to enable consumers of food products to further trust the safety of the food they eat.

ELISA (Enzyme linked immunosorbent assay) is the method used most frequently for peanut allergen detection in the food manufacturing industry because of its sensitivity and ease of use. However, it has disadvantages in certain settings. It is not currently validated for complex food matrices, as it is believed that the effects of both food matrices and food processing could result in an underestimation of peanut concentrations in thermally processed foods, leading to false negatives, as well as overestimation in complex food matrices, leading to false positives which are a potential food safety hazard to consumers.

Food Safety Tech: Tell us about the research that the Mars Global Food Safety Center is doing to help the industry with effective methods for peanut quantification.

Zhang: At the Mars Global Food Safety Center (GFSC) we believe that everyone has the right to safe food and that we have a responsibility to generate and share insights to help solve for global food safety challenges. We also know we can’t tackle these alone, which is why we collaborate with external partners. One of our focus areas is advancing understanding and knowledge sharing in peanut allergen detection. As part of that work, we are exploring methods of improving food safety via the development of advanced analytical methods to detect peanut allergen content, in the hopes that it will enable the food industry to expand on current preventative management protocols, including early detection methodologies, for faster response to future food allergen contamination events.

As part of our latest published research, we investigated the accuracy and sensitivity of ELISA-based test methods on raw and cooked wheat flour, wheat flour-salt and wheat flour-salt-oil matrices, which are common ingredients in the food industry. 10 ppm peanut was doped into each matrix during sample preparation. Recovery testing demonstrated that in all matrices the current industry standard ELISA method overestimated results with recoveries ranging from 49.6 to 68.6 ppm.
These findings prompted the development of a new confirmatory method based on liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry (HPLC-MS/MS) for peanut quantification. When subjected to the same validation testing programme the HPLC-MS/MS technique was demonstrably more accurate and sensitive, with a limit of quantification of 0.3 ppm and the detected peanut concentration ranging from 6.8 to 12.8 ppm for samples doped with 10 ppm peanut.

This work is a first step in the development of a new standard method for peanut detection in complex food matrices and could ultimately inform safer manufacturing Quality & Food Safety (Q&FS) processes across global supply chains to help ensure safe food for all.

Mars GFSC Lab Food Integrity Team
The Lab Food Integrity Team at the Mars Global Food Safety Center.

Food Safety Tech: What projects are researchers at the Center working on to enhance allergen management as a whole?

Zhang: A successful allergen management program depends on rigorous control of allergenic foods and ingredients from all other products and ingredients at every step of the food production process, from raw material development to the delivery of final products. This means that for allergen management practices to be effective, they must be a shared responsibility between food manufacturers, government agencies, regulators and consumers.

At the Mars GFSC, we take a precompetitive approach to research, knowledge sharing and collaborations—this means we openly share insights and expertise to help ensure safe food for all. This is important in driving forward innovations, helping unlock solutions that may not have previously been possible.

We have shared our latest work both through an open access publication in Food Additives & Contaminants: Part A but also directly with regulatory bodies such as the FDA in the hopes of advancing knowledge in both food safety risk management and allergen management in complex flour-based media within global supply chains. In addition to this, this research contributes to a wider Food Safety Best Practice whitepaper focused on food allergen risk management currently under draft by the Mars GFSC, which will be published in collaboration with Walmart Food Safety Collaboration Center and the Chinese Institute of Food Science and Technology (CIFST) later this year.

We believe that global collaborations such as this are essential to improving food allergen management and mitigating food safety risks. Communication, training and knowledge sharing are core principles of the Mars GFSC and as such form a large part of our ongoing activities in this space. For example, we have hosted Food Allergen Management workshops in collaboration with Danone and Romer Labs focused on helping to raise awareness of current and future food allergen trends. At one such event in 2019, 100 participants from 16 food companies came together to promote food allergen management in the industry and ensure that the next generation of food integrity testing capability is relevant, practical, and directly applicable to the real-world problems experienced by manufacturers and processors throughout the supply chain.

Representatives of the Mars GFSC have also shared our insights externally at a number of international conferences as well as during a Food Enterprise Food Allergen Management Seminar on topics including effective allergen management procedures, our guiding principles for allergen managements at Mars, and shared our approach to encourage and share knowledge with other manufactures in this area.

We continue to support requests for technical insights, for example providing insights during a global consultation session on General Principles for Labeling of Prepackaged Food. This resulted in the addition of characterization requirements for possible allergenic substances, promoting the use of a recognizable naming system in ingredient lists that contain allergen warnings.

Food Safety Tech: Can you comment on additional work your team is doing in the area of food fraud?

Zhang: Food allergen risk management forms only one part of our wider food integrity focus at the Mars GFSC. We are committed to helping ensure food authenticity in an increasingly complex, global food supply chain through collaboration with global partners to develop new and improved tools and analytical methods that help protect the integrity of raw materials and finished products.

We have collaborated with researchers at Michigan State University to develop a Food Fraud Prevention Cycle roadmap (Introducing the Food Fraud Prevention Cycle (FFPC): A dynamic information management and strategic roadmap) which answered questions such as how to detect food fraud, how to start a food fraud prevention program, what to do in terms of testing, how much testing is enough, and how to measure success. Our intention in publishing this research was that the adoption of a holistic and all-encompassing information management cycle will enable a globally harmonized approach and the continued sharing of best practices across industry partners.

More recently, we completed an international collaboration tackling rice adulteration together with Queen’s University Belfast (QUB), Agilent Technologies, International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), China National Center for Food Safety Risk Assessment (CFSA), and Zhejiang Yangtze Delta Institute of Tsinghua University (Yangtze Delta). This work successfully developed a two-tier testing program, capable of rapidly screening the geographical origins of rice within the global supply chain (Food Fingerprinting: Using a two-tiered approach to monitor and mitigate food fraud in rice). By developing a tiered system, we could ensure that manufacturers use the right techniques for the right occasion, to maximize the information available in investigating food fraud at the best value. As part of this work, we have helped develop hands-on training in Ghana and inform best practice guidance to help build the foundations of a strong food safety culture in rice authenticity across the global supply chain.

Food Safety Consortium Virtual Conference Series

2021 FSC Episode 7 Preview: Food Safety Supply Chain Management

By Food Safety Tech Staff
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Food Safety Consortium Virtual Conference Series

This week’s episode of the 2021 Food Safety Consortium Virtual Conference Series will dive into the challenges of effectively managing your food supply chain. The following is the agenda for Thursday’s episode, which begins at 12 pm ET.

  • Enterprise Risk Management with Melanie Neumann, Matrix Sciences
  • The Role of Food Safety Certification in Supply Chain Management, a presentation by food safety experts Roy Kirby and Alec Kyriakides, followed by a panel discussion led by Erica Sheward, GFSI
  • Supplier Certification Management—Untangle the Chaos without Breaking the Bank, a panel discussion with David Black, RizePoint; Kari Neubauer, Ceres Certifications, Intl; and Karl Kolb, Ph.D, The High Sierra Group; moderated by Kari Hension, RizePoint
  • Accredited Third Party Certification Program, An FDA Update with Doriliz De Leon, FDA
  • Closing Remarks and Industry Commentary with Trish Wester, AFSAP
  • Tech Talk presented by David Black, Rizepoint

The Fall program runs every Thursday from October 7 through November 4. Haven’t registered? Follow this link to the 2021 Food Safety Consortium Virtual Conference Series, which provides access to all the episodes featuring critical industry insights from leading subject matter experts!

 

Kari Hensien, RizePoint

Ask the Expert: Now Is the Time to Modernize Audits to Reduce Risk & Audit Fatigue

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Kari Hensien, RizePoint

Q: Why would a company think about changing auditing methods if their current process is working well?

Kari Hensien: Simply put, you don’t know what you don’t know. Many companies believe they have a strong auditing program because they have not yet seen a problem. However, that doesn’t mean that an unsafe or noncompliant behavior hasn’t happened, it only means that it hasn’t surfaced.

Problems may arise that are more difficult to catch in an audit. Factories are tired from repeating the same audit for multiple clients, auditors are exhausted from long days and doing the same work twice, and this type of audit fatigue can lead to audits being rushed or errors being introduced in data entry.

Companies have gotten comfortable with more manual auditing processes – clipboards, spreadsheets, binders – as they’ve evolved over several decades. Any change to the status quo will cause some degree of discomfort, so there’s an understandable reluctance to make a change without a major catalyst.

In this case though, the catalyst may not have been within a company, but rather changes to the industry the company operates in. Regulations are stronger than ever, supply chains have become more complex, and suppliers and brands are asking more questions about where their food comes from and how it’s processed. Further, standards bodies have begun the process of requiring digital audit submission for better tracking and that trend is likely to continue.

These changes are happening because manual or traditional auditing creates blind spots in the quality, safety, and risk management program.

  • Data collected manually is difficult to aggregate, which makes spotting trends difficult and delays catching potential issues before they become problems.
  • Manual audits create audit fatigue because results can’t be shared across certifying bodies or inspectors, and suppliers must complete the same audit for each customer.
  • Corrective actions become time consuming and difficult to track without automation.

Q: What options are available to strengthen audit programs?

Hensien: Companies should not have to give up an auditing program they like to adopt new technology. In fact, having a strong process is an advantage when looking to improve the process already in place. This means bringing in technology will be additive rather than disruptive.

Companies that are looking to modernize their quality and risk auditing programs have a variety of options. Digital auditing solutions run the gamut from simple online forms to full enterprise platforms. Here are some of the features companies may find in modern auditing solutions.

  • Digital auditing forms. These are one step above the manual process. Auditors can input data directly into the form and skip the step of then having to transcribe results.
  • Comprehensive reporting. Holistic, timely reporting is a key advantage of moving away from manual audits, and more enterprise quality management platforms will include it. A centralized data warehouse of audit data makes it easy for companies to have visibility into whatever matters most.
  • Data integration. For companies monitoring large supply chains, complex business structures, and external quality indicators, integrating multiple data sources gives a comprehensive look at the factors that contribute to quality and safety. Data integrations bring in information from partners, third-party auditors, and more to get a full view of critical information.
  • Automated corrective actions. Mistakes are inevitable, but how they are handled can make or break a business. Having corrective actions, and their follow up, automated when something is out of compliance takes the guesswork out of whether it’s been handled effectively.

What matters most is that any company looking to improve their existing model take the time to identify what risks exist and how new technology can help mitigate those. For example, not every company needs to bring in data from external sources. But if a standards body they work with recently began requiring digital audit submissions, then digital forms are a logical choice to avoid any audit-fatigue related errors when transcribing data into the submission portal.

Finding the capabilities available to reveal the blind spots that existed in the manual auditing process reduces the friction and fatigue in auditing. Administrators are able to better see and understand all parts of quality and safety management, auditors can spend more time thoughtfully working with those being auditing, and suppliers and factories can share digital audit results with multiple customers rather than repeating the same audit many times.

Learn more about how audit fatigue affects the effectiveness of quality and safety management programs, and how to fight audit fatigue in this free whitepaper.

 

Kari Hensien, RizePointAbout Kari Hensien

As president of RizePoint, Hensien is championing a new continuous quality initiative. Since travel and interpersonal interactions have been devastated by COVID-19, it’s been challenging for businesses to obtain regular third-party audits, which are integral to access and analyze key data and ensure safety compliance across the enterprise. Hensien is facilitating an increased self-assessment auditing model, where businesses and their locations can use RizePoint’s digital platform themselves, resulting in more frequent audits and broader visibility during the pandemic and beyond.

Content sponsored by RizePoint.

Checklist

2020 FSC Episode 3 Wrap: Does Your Company Have a COVID Czar?

By Maria Fontanazza
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Checklist

Navigating the murky waters that COVID-19 presents has been no easy task for food companies. Being part of America’s critical infrastructure has meant that adapting to the pandemic has been unavoidable, and the industry has directly taken on the challenges to ensure the nation has a reliable food supply. But what about the frontline workers, their safety and how this ties into operational continuity as a whole? During last week’s episode of the 2020 Food Safety Consortium Virtual Conference Series, an expert panel discussed the practices that food companies have put in place during the pandemic and offered advice on managing the entire scope of COVID-19 challenges including screening employees and preventing infection transmission, safeguarding workers and the facility, administrative and engineering controls, education and training, and risk management.

“No doubt that it is a concert of controls and interventions that have allowed our industry to effectively combat this over the past several months,” said Sanjay Gummalla, senior vice president of scientific affairs at the American Frozen Foods Institute. “By and large, the industry has taken charge of this situation in a way that could not have been predicted.” Gummalla was joined by Trish Wester, founder of the Association for Food Safety Auditing Professionals and Melanie Neumann, executive vice president and general counsel for Matrix Sciences International.

First up, the COVID Czar—what is it and does your company have one? According to Neumann, this is a designated person, located both within a production facility as well as at the corporate location, who manages the bulk of the requirements and precautions that companies should be undertaking to address the pandemic. “We’re not trained in people safety—we’re trained in food safety,” said Neumann. “And it’s a lot to ask, especially on top of having to manage food safety.”

Some of the takeaways during the discussion include:

  • Administrative controls that must be managed: Appropriate cleaning, disinfection and sanitation; PPE; employee hygiene; shift management; and surveillance mechanisms
  • PPE: “It’s really clear now that face masks and coverings are critical in managing source control—it prevents the spread and protects other employees,” said Gummalla. “All employees wearing masks present the highest level of protection.” When the attendees were polled about whether face coverings are mandatory where they work, 91% answered ‘yes’.
  • Engineering controls within facility: Physical distancing measures such as plexiglass barriers, six-foot distance markings, traffic movement, limited employees, and hand sanitizer stations. “Engineering controls in a facility involve isolation from the virus,” said Gummalla. “In this case, controlling [and] reducing the exposure to the virus without relying on specific worker behavior. This is where facilities have implemented a great amount of thoughtful intervention, probably at a high capital cost as well.” Companies should also consider airflow management, which can involving bringing in an outside professional with expertise in negative and positive air pressure, advised Wester.
  • Verification activities and enterprise risk management: Neumann emphasized the importance of documentation as well as advising companies to apply a maturity model (similar to a food safety culture maturity model) to a COVID control program. The goal is to ensure that employees are following certain behaviors when no one is watching. “We want to be able to go from ‘told’ to ‘habit’,” she said.
  • Education and training: Using posters, infographics, brochures and videos, all of which are multilingual, to help emphasize that responsibility lies with every employee. “It is important to recognize the transmission is predominately is person to person,” said Gummalla. Do you have a daily huddle? Neumann suggests having a regular dialogue with employees about COVID.
  • The future, 2021 and beyond: Does your company have a contingency, preparedness or recovery plan? “The next six months are going to be critical; in many parts of the world, the worse is not over yet,” said Gummalla. “There will be a lot more innovation in our industry, and communication will be at the heart of all of this.”

As part of a special offering, Episode 3 has been made available for viewing on demand for free. Register to view the on-demand recording.

Carla Zarazir, Lebanese University
FST Soapbox

Coronavirus and Food Security

By Carla Zarazir
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Carla Zarazir, Lebanese University

The novel coronavirus (COVID-19) has been quickly spreading across the globe, which triggered most affected countries to officially declare a state of public health emergency. The World Health Organization (WHO) has labeled this rather fast outbreak as pandemic. Food companies were urged to apply proper hygiene practices such as regular handwashing and surface cleaning to keep the risk of contagion at its lowest level.1 At the moment, there are many ongoing clinical trials evaluating potential treatments for COVID-19 but no specific vaccine or medicine have been publicly made available, as of this writing.

COVID-19 belongs to a family of viruses that cause respiratory issues and can be passed on directly through contact with an infected person’s body fluids (i.e, cough or sneeze discharge) and indirectly, through contact with contaminated surfaces.2 But can the virus be transmitted through edible goods?

Coronavirus Transmission through Food
According to the CDC, there is no current indication to support the transmission of COVID-19 through food since, in general, it needs a living host on which to grow. However, sharing food and beverages, especially in public places, is discouraged. Moreover, good food safety practices are highly recommended, including refrigerating, keeping raw and cooked goods separated and heating food at suitable temperature (around 75 ̊ C).3

If the consumed food is hypothetically contaminated with the virus, the stomach acid (due to its acidic nature) will immediately inactivate it. In addition, COVID-19 cannot affect the body internally via the intestines. One rare exception to the previous statement occurs when the virus gets in contact with a specific type of respiratory cells.

According to food safety experts, foodborne illnesses are generally caused by bacterial cells that have the ability to grow in food and multiply rapidly within a short amount of time. On the other hand, viruses are dormant particles floating around living cells; only when they successfully breaks into the aforementioned cells, the multiplication process can take place.1,3

General Food Safety Advice for Food Businesses

Food manufacturers must follow good hygiene and safety practices to help ensure the consistent quality and safety of their products:4,5,6

  • Purchase raw material from reputable sources
  • Cook food thoroughly and maintain safe holding temperatures
  • Clean and sanitize surfaces (such as cooking boards, refrigerators handles, etc.) and equipment
  • Properly train staff in taking extreme hygiene measures
  • Employees showing signs of infectious illness must not attend work
  • Implement appropriate risk management strategies (e.g,. encourage social distancing and endorse online meetings when applicable)
  • Number of staff in a kitchen or food preparation area should be kept to a bare minimum
  • Space out workstations and food preparation areas, when possible

References

  1. World Health Organization. (2020). Coronavirus disease: advice for the public.
  2. Food Standards Australia & New Zealand. (2020). Novel Coronavirus and Food Safety.
  3. CDC. 2020. Food Safety and Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19).
  4. Harvard Health Publishing, Harvard Medical School. (2020). Coronavirus Resource Center.
  5. European Food Safety Authority (EFSA). 2020. Coronavirus: no evidence that food is a source or transmission route.
  6. USDA.(2020). Coronavirus Disease (COVID-19).
Crop spraying, Ellutia

From Farm to Fork: The Importance of Nitrosamine Testing in Food Safety

By Andrew James
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Crop spraying, Ellutia

N-nitroso compounds (NOCs), or nitrosamines, have once again made headline news as their occurrence in some pharmaceuticals has led to high profile product recalls in the United States.1 Nitrosamines can be carcinogenic and genotoxic and, in the food industry, can compromise a food product’s quality and safety. One nitrosamine in particular, N-nitrosodimethylamine (NDMA), is a highly potent carcinogen, traces of which are commonly detected in foods and may be used as an indicator compound for the presence of nitrosamines.2

NOCs can potentially make their way into the food chain in a number of ways, including (but not limited to): Via the crop protection products used to maximize agricultural yields; via the sodium and/or potassium salt added to preserve certain meats from bacterial contamination; as a result of the direct-fire drying process in certain foods; and via consumption of nitrates in the diet (present in many vegetables due to natural mineral deposits in the soil), which react with bacteria and acids in the stomach to form nitrosamines.3

The crop protection and food manufacturing industries are focused on ensuring that levels of nitrosamines present in foods are minimal and safe. Detection technology for quantitating the amount of nitrosamines (ppm levels) in a sample had not advanced in nearly 40 years—until recently. Now, a thermal energy analyzer (TEA) —a sensitive and specific detector—is being relied on to provide fast and sensitive analysis for players throughout the food supply chain.

Regulatory Landscape

Both NDMA and the nitrosamine N-nitrososodiethylamine (NDEA) have been classified by national and international regulatory authorities as ‘probable human carcinogens’.3 NDMA in particular is by far the most commonly encountered member of this group of compounds.7

In the United States there are limits for NDMA or total nitrosamines in bacon, barley malt, ham and malt beverages, yet there are currently no regulatory limits for N-nitroso compounds (NOC) in foods in the EU.7

Developers of crop protection products are required to verify the absence of nitrosamines or quantify the amount at ppm levels to ensure they are within the accepted guidelines.

Crop Protection

The presence of nitrosamines must be traced and risk-managed along the food’s journey from farm to fork. The issue affects testing from the very beginning – particularly at the crop protection stage, which is one of the most highly regulated industries in the world. Without crop protection, food and drink expenditures could increase by up to £70 million per year and 40% of the world’s food would not exist.7

Development of a new crop protection product (herbicide, fungicide, insecticide or seed treatment) involves several steps: Discovery and formulation of the product, trials and field development, toxicology, environmental impacts and final registration. New product registration requires demonstration of safety for all aspects of the environment, the workers, the crops that are being protected and the food that is consumed. This involves comprehensive risk assessments being carried out, based on data from numerous safety studies and an understanding of Good Agricultural Practice (GAP).

One global producer of agrochemicals uses a custom version of the TEA to verify the absence of nitrosamines or quantitate the amount of nitrosamines (ppm levels) in its active ingredients. The LC-TEA enables high selectivity for nitro, nitroso and nitrogen (when operating in nitrogen mode), which allows only the compounds of interest to be seen. Additionally, it provides very high sensitivity (<2pg N/sec Signal to Noise 3:1), meaning it is able to detect compounds of interest at extremely low levels. To gain this high sensitivity and specificity, it relies on a selective thermal cleavage of N-NO bond and detection of the liberated NO radical by the chemiluminescent signal generated by its reaction with ozone.

The customized system also uses a different interface with a furnace, rather than the standard pyrolyser, to allow for the additional energy required and larger diameter tubing for working with a liquid sample rather than gas.

The system allows a company to run five to six times more samples with increased automation. As a direct result, significant productivity gains, reduced maintenance costs and more accurate results can be realized.

Food Analysis

Since nitrite was introduced in food preservation in the 1960s, its safety has been debated. The debate continues today, largely because of the benefits of nitrite in food products, particularly processed meats.6 In pork products, such as bacon and cured ham, nitrite is mostly present in the sodium and/or potassium salt added to preserve the meat from bacterial contamination. Although the meat curing process was designed to support preservation without refrigeration, a number of other benefits, such as enhancing color and taste, have since been recognized.

Analytical methods for the determination of N-nitrosamines in foods can differ between volatile and non-volatile compounds. Following extraction, volatile N-nitrosamines can be readily separated by GC using a capillary column and then detected by a TEA detector. The introduction of the TEA offered a new way to determine nitrosamine levels at a time when GC-MS could do so only with difficulty.

To identify and determine constituent amounts of NOCs in foods formed as a direct result of manufacturing and processing, the Food Standards Agency (FSA) approached Premier Analytical Services (PAS) to develop a screening method to identify and determine constituent amounts of NOCs in foods formed as a direct result of manufacturing and processing.

A rapid and selective apparent total nitrosamine content (ATNC) food screening method has been developed with a TEA. This has also been validated for the known dietary NOCs of concern. This method, however, is reliant on semi-selective chemical denitrosation reactions and can give false positives. The results can only be considered as a potential indicator rather than definitive proof of NOC presence.

In tests, approximately half (36 out of 63) samples returned a positive ATNC result. Further analysis of these samples by GC-MS/MS detected volatile nitrosamine contamination in two of 25 samples.

A key role of the TEA in this study was to validate the alternative analytical method of GC-MS/MS. After validation of the technique by TEA, GC-MS/MS has been proven to be highly sensitive and selective for this type of testing.

The Future of Nitrosamine Testing

Many countries have published data showing that toxicological risk from preformed NOCs was no longer considered an area for concern. Possible risks may come from the unintentional addition or contamination of foods with NOCs precursors such as nitrite and from endogenous formation of NOCs and more research is being done in this area.

Research and innovation are the foundations of a competitive food industry. Research in the plant protection industry is driven by farming and the food chain’s demand for greater efficiency and safer products. Because the amount of nitrosamines in food that results in health effects in humans is still unknown, there is scope for research into the chemical formation and transportation of nitrosamines, their occurrence and their impact on our health. Newer chromatographic techniques are only just being applied in this area and could greatly benefit the quantification of nitrosamines. It is essential that these new approaches to quality and validation are applied throughout the food chain.

References

  1. Christensen, J. (2020). More popular heartburn medications recalled due to impurity. CNN.
  2. Hamlet, C, Liang, L. (2017). An investigation to establish the types and levels of N-nitroso compounds (NOC) in UK consumed foods. Premier Analytical Services, 1-79.
  3. Woodcock, J. (2019). Statement alerting patients and health care professionals of NDMA found in samples of ranitidine. Center for Drug Evaluation and Research.
  4. Scanlan, RA. (1983). Formation and occurrence of nitrosamines in food. Cancer res, 43(5) 2435-2440.
  5.  Dowden, A. (2019). The truth about nitrates in your food. BBC Future.
  6.  Park, E. (2015). Distribution of Seven N-nitrosamines in Food. Toxicological research, 31(3) 279-288, doi: 10.5487/TR.2015.31.3.279.
  7.  Crews, C. (2019). The determination of N-nitrosamines in food. Quality Assurance and Safety of Crops & Foods, 1-11, doi: 10.1111/j.1757-837X.2010.00049.x
  8. (1989) Toxicological profile for n-Nitrosodimethylamine., Agency for Toxic substances and disease registry.
  9. Rickard, S. (2010). The value of crop protection, Crop Protection Association.
food safety tech

Next Week: Attend the ‘Drivers in Food Safety Testing’ Webinar

By Food Safety Tech Staff
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food safety tech
Angela Anandappa, Alliance for Advanced Sanitation
Angela Anandappa, Ph.D., founding director of the Alliance for Advanced Sanitation and member of the FST Advisory Board

Join Food Safety Tech next week for the first in a series of complimentary webinars, called Drivers in Food Safety Testing, about the important components and issues that encompass food safety testing. Angela Anandappa, Ph.D., founding director of the Alliance for Advanced Sanitation and member of the FST Advisory Board, will lead the discussion with a presentation about Technologies Leading the Way. The complimentary webinar is aimed at food safety professionals within quality assurance and control, compliance, food lab and contract lab management, and risk management. A technology spotlight given by Lyssa Sakaley, senior global product manager for molecular pathogen testing at MilliporeSigma will follow Anandappa’s presentation. The event will conclude with an interactive Q&A with attendees.

Drivers in Food Safety Testing: Technologies Leading the Way
Wednesday, March 18 at 1 pm ET
Register now!

Food Labs Conference Announced for Spring 2020

By Food Safety Tech Staff
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— UPDATE — March 9, 2020 – IPC and the Food Labs/Cannabis Labs Conference want to reassure you, that in case of any disruption that may prevent the production of this live event at its physical location in Rockville, MD due to COVID-19, all sessions will be converted to a virtual conference on the already planned dates. Please note that if you initially register as a virtual participant (meaning you have no intentions of traveling to the event regardless) and the on-site event is not cancelled, you will ONLY be able to listen to the General Sessions and the Cannabis Sessions. You will have not have access to the Food Labs Sessions and there will be NO recording of these sessions. If you have any questions, please contact Veronica Allen, Event Manager.

–END UPDATE —

EDGARTOWN, MA, Jan. 22, 2020 – Innovative Publishing Co., the publisher of Food Safety Tech and organizer of the Food Safety Consortium Conference & Expo is announcing the launch of the Food Labs Conference. The event will address regulatory, compliance and risk management issues that companies face in the area of testing and food laboratory management. It will take place on June 3–4 in Rockville, MD.

Some of the critical topics include discussion of FDA’s proposed FSMA rule, Laboratory Accreditation Program for Food Testing; considerations in laboratory design; pathogen testing and detection; food fraud; advances in testing and lab technology; allergen testing, control and management; validation and proficiency testing; and much more.

The event is co-located with the Cannabis Labs Conference, which will focus on science, technology, regulatory compliance and quality management. More information about this event is available on Cannabis Industry Journal.

“By presenting two industry conferences under one roof, we can provide attendees with technology, regulatory compliance and best practices that cannabis and food might share but also focused topics that are unique to cannabis or food laboratory industry needs,” said Rick Biros, president of Innovative Publishing Co., Inc. and director of the Food Labs Conference.

The call for abstracts is open until February 28.

The agenda and speakers will be announced in early March.

About Food Safety Tech
Food Safety Tech publishes news, technology, trends, regulations, and expert opinions on food safety, food quality, food business and food sustainability. We also offer educational, career advancement and networking opportunities to the global food industry. This information exchange is facilitated through ePublishing, digital and live events.

Bob Burrows, Chainvu
FST Soapbox

Five Steps To Overcome the Catch-22 Dilemma Of Blockchain Adoption In Your Food Supply Chain

By Bob Burrows
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Bob Burrows, Chainvu

Have you ever heard the saying, “It takes a village to raise a child”? This saying can easily be adapted to blockchain in the food supply chain, only it would say, “It takes a village to do blockchain successfully.”

Blockchain, by definition, requires the collaboration and consensus of all of its participants. If you look at a commonly accepted definition, blockchain is a sequence of consensually verified transaction blocks chained together, with each of the supply chain members as an equal owner of the same transaction data.

In the food supply chain context, this means that all supply chain participants—from the farmer/grower to the retail store and, in some scenarios, even the end consumer—have to be part of the blockchain or it will fail.

But therein lies the problem.

The Blockchain Catch-22 Adoption Dilemma

While blockchain has the potential to revolutionize the food industry (e.g., the way we handle food recalls), it puts innovators in today’s complex food supply chains in an awkward Catch-22 dilemma.

Unless you are Walmart or another equally big force in the food industry with the buying power to demand that your suppliers adopt blockchain, you cannot implement blockchain successfully without your entire supply chain joining you. But oftentimes, your partners (and sometimes your management) require the commitment of all others jumping on the blockchain bandwagon.

While this situation could feel intimidating, those obstacles are usually easily overcome with the right arguments presented in a sound business case. I want to share with you five tried-and-true steps to get even the most reluctant technophobic supply chain member excited about blockchain and ready to sign on.

1. Clearly Outline Risks Across the Entire Supply Chain

One of the biggest (and most expensive) mistakes companies make when adopting blockchain is to adopt a new technology purely for the sake of it. Therefore, the starting point for any negotiations should be to outline the real business problems you are trying to solve. Put yourself in the shoes of your partners’ management and explain the problems from their perspective.

But don’t try to boil the ocean—just focus on two or three main issues that could either have disastrous (as in business operation/reputation-destroying) consequences or become extremely costly issues. Additionally, you could include a short list of secondary issues to preempt questions about other concerns.

For example, facing a food safety incident and the associated food recalls could be your primary issues. Secondary issues might be product integrity and spoilage (due to the long transit times and possible temperature fluctuations along the way), compliance with government regulations regarding cost and resources, and the consumers’ demand for transparency and traceability.

2. Calculate the Cost of Doing Nothing

Once you have identified the biggest risks, it’s time to put some numbers on paper.
Let’s stay with the example of food safety and recalls. According to the Grocery Manufacturers Association, the average food recall in the United States costs businesses $30–99 million, which only includes direct costs from retrieval and disposal of recalled items without taking additional expenses for lawsuits, reputational damages and sales losses into account.

What would a recall scenario look like for your company, and what costs would be associated with it? What does your liability management for this scenario look like across the entire supply chain? Walk through the scenario step-by-step and put down realistic numbers. Be sure you can back it up with real data at any point in time.

3. Explain the Proposed Solution (Without Getting Too Technical)

Now that you have outlined the biggest risks and walked them through the numbers, it is time to present your proposed solution. When doing so, keep in mind that most people who are not very familiar with blockchain think immediately of Bitcoin and cryptocurrency—including the hype, unpredictability and hacks.

Rather than leading with technical explanations, try to first explain your solution from a business perspective without using the word “blockchain.” Frank Yiannas, the former Walmart vice president of food safety and now deputy commissioner, food policy and response for the FDA, once described blockchain as “the equivalent of FedEx tracking for food.” This is the level of technicality you want to hit.

Once you have buy-in for the overall approach, you can lay out the technical details including how blockchain, IoT-enabled sensors and smart contracts fit into this picture.

4. Showcase Lowest Hanging Fruit First, Then Define Long-Term Benefits & Soft Savings

Pat yourself on the back—you have just overcome the biggest hurdle in the process. Now it is time to bring the deal home by laying out the quick wins (low-hanging fruit) and the long-term benefits.

If you implement a blockchain solution paired with smart sensors to constantly monitor your product’s temperature, shock impact, moisture and location, a huge quick win could be the ability to immediately identify any potentially spoiled or compromised items. All members of the supply chain could get an instant notification if an exception occurs.

While listing the immediate benefits and calculating potential savings is crucial for getting buy-in, the long-term benefits are also important. For example, you could point out that consumers (especially millennials) are willing to spend more money on brands that offer more transparency, brands they can trust (e.g., authenticity of extra virgin olive oil), and brands they can trace back to their origins (provenance).

In addition, there are also efficiency gains through blockchain. When speaking to your own management, point out the ability to improve your own operations due to the increased level of automation, as well as the opportunity for improving the overall supply chain efficiencies by collecting data across the supply chain.

Just be sure that your benefits correlate with the problems you had outlined initially.

5. Have a Detailed Adoption Roadmap

Last but not least, be prepared to have a detailed adoption road map. This is crucial, as it allows you to take their enthusiasm to the next level. All the other steps are for nought if this isn’t put into action. Go the extra mile to set your project up for success and map out the key details, including:

  • Proposed project timelines (e.g., onboarding phase, trial start and end dates, decision deadlines),
  • Must-meet milestones and key performance indicators
  • Expected road blocks and how you will address them

While this puts extra responsibility on your team, it allows you to keep driving the project forward and at least bring it to a trial or pilot stage that will give you more tangible benefits.

Conclusion

Whether you follow these tips step-by-step or you pick and choose, I would like you to take one thing away from reading this: While there is tremendous potential in blockchain, don’t implement it purely for the sake of catchy headlines or bragging rights! To get your supply chain partners and executive management on board, you must tie the implementation to relevant business use cases to achieve tangible results.

Richard Wilson, AuditComply
FST Soapbox

Why SaaS and Food Safety Are A Perfect Match

By Richard Wilson
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Richard Wilson, AuditComply

Food manufacturers, what’s keeping you up at night? What’s the one issue that could damage your reputation so badly that you lose customers? The answer: A food safety crisis that at best, requires your products to be recalled and at worst, puts valued consumers at risk.

Similarly, if you’re a global supply chain manager, what’s your number one worry? The answer: Maintaining continuous compliance with industry standards, meeting increased regulation requirements, or maybe it’s a key supplier failing their BRC audit?

Whatever it is, we all know food manufacturers are under increased pressure, facing multiple internal and external challenges in an ever-changing complex environment. Challenges such as price volatility, stronger competition, increasing customer demands, complex supply chains and globalization are all taking their toll.

Furthermore, to add to this increasing pressure, organizations are still relying on paper-based systems and manual processes to help manage their risk, quality and compliance, and even their environmental health and safety (EHS)! This approach is inefficient, makes the audit and compliance process costly and difficult to scale, while compromising quality and complicating traceability. It’s time to take advantage of the digital age and relieve the pain and pressure of traditional risk and compliance management with a SaaS (software as a service) solution.

What is SaaS (Software as a Service)?

SaaS providers use the internet to deliver their bespoke software offering, usually in the form of a subscription-based service with a monthly or annual fee. The main benefit of SaaS is the cloud, being cloud-based software, upgrades and fixes are managed by the software provider, reducing or eliminating the need for an IT infrastructure—all your data is readily available in real time, on one centralized platform. SaaS is delivering more visibility and mobility without hassling organizations with the details and streamlining software integration across the globe.

SaaS solutions have become a game changer in modern risk management, and the following points illustrate why.

Speed of Deployment

Food and beverage manufacturers require a SaaS solution for multi-site global deployment with complete local management. A SaaS solution will graft onto your business processes immediately. No additional IT hardware should be needed, which means you don’t waste your time procuring and installing an IT infrastructure for multiple sites to benefit. It’s important to remember that the food and beverage industry is moving fast, so if your chosen SaaS solution requires months or years to implement, you’re talking to the wrong people. There is a common saying at my company: “We don’t count in months or years, we count in hours and minutes”.

Providers that offer traditional, on-premise solutions, require extensive configuration and bespoke coding to map to the client’s needs. Long rollout and deployment cycles are inherently expensive to maintain and have poor user experience. This is the reason most consumers revert to Excel/Word and Sharepoint, ultimately losing the ability to manage consistently at scale across their real estate. With an RPM (risk and performance management) SaaS solution you can expect a fast deployment with a comprehensive and configurable enterprise workflow from day one.

Staying Up to Date Is Automatic

Your chosen SaaS provider manage your entire solution from their side, which means upgrades, fixes and customization requests are immediate and automatic. Again, reducing or eliminating, the resource needs of an IT infrastructure. Organizations will have the advantage of immediately being able to utilize the latest features the SaaS solution has to offer. These upgrades will often be driven by feedback from users as organizational and industry requirements change. On-going system development will be crucial to staying in, and assuring, compliance and risk mitigation.

As a food manufacturer, it is important that your SaaS solution comes with a comprehensive document control library—a feature that will always be automatically updated by your SaaS provider. When you are conducting assessments in the field, many users require the ability to refer back to specific document types such as manuals, procedures, work instructions and the latest standards or regulations. These documents should be all managed by your SaaS provider, with teams consistently reviewing and updating important industry documentation on the platform for any user out in the field.

Ease of Use

Proofs of concept are crucial. Living in a world where we have an abundant amount of choice, organizations need to know their chosen SaaS solution has the ability to meet requirements and demands of both the organization and industry. This is made easy with SaaS, allowing organizations to test the software functionality in advance of purchase. Even for large food manufacturers, SaaS offerings can be used to test the software before it is purchased, and there should be no limit to the amount of trial users. The right risk and performance platform will also allow your team to upload specific templates, allowing new users to be familiar with assessments provided on the platform, easing your transition to a digital format.

Mobility and 360o Visibility

For further flexibility, popular SaaS providers will offer their solution in mobile format. Assessments conducted on the platform should be seamlessly synchronized between smartphone, tablet and desktop, allowing you to start an assessment on one platform and then pick it up on another. Users are no longer restricted to one location and can access their robust platform from any device, online or offline. We know that many companies are operating in

harsh environments, whether it’s the scorching temperatures of the Sahara desert or the blistering wind chills of northern Canada—your SaaS solution needs to come equipped with the right tools. By utilizing SaaS mobile offerings, organizations gain full visibility of their risk profile, making room for a culture of continuous compliance whether they’re in the field or back at the office.

Scalability at a Lower Cost

Implementing a SaaS solution means all your data is securely stored in the cloud. This provides scalability to match organizational growth strategies. Food manufacturers can add more users as their business grows without ever thinking about changing the hardware or requiring a full IT department for assistance. However, although SaaS offerings are provided at a lower cost than traditional solutions, each platform has its own rates, so shop around for a solution that will best suit your budget and requirements.

Bottom Line

Cloud-based software models have made risk, quality and compliance more affordable and flexible, considerably improving and streamlining business processes worldwide. Next time you are evaluating a SaaS solution for your food and beverage organizations, remember, the providers are staking their own survival on the software platform working. Whether it’s the protection, security, availability or performance of your data. Providers want to make their platforms a hassle-free and secure option for any food manufacturer looking to thrive in this demanding industry.

Relieve the pain and pressure of traditional risk and compliance management: Realize your investment from day one.