Are you Audit and Recall Ready:
The Auditor is here… the call that is heard across organizations as the SQF auditor arrives. Employees scramble from the office to the plant throughout all the workstations across the company… the auditor is here…. Sound familiar?
The Safe Quality Food (SQF) Program is a rigorous and credible food safety and quality program that is recognized by retailers, brand owners, and food service providers world-wide. Recognized by the Global Food Safety Initiative (GFSI), the SQF family of food safety and quality codes are designed to meet industry, customer, and regulatory requirements for all sectors of the food supply chain – from the farm all the way to the retail stores. – SQF institute
SQF audits will reach across most every business as our technological ability increases to capture and retain relevant food safety data throughout the life of ingredients and packaging. Farm to Fork along with many other catch phrases are being generated to illustrate complete traceability. All for excellent reason, worldwide traceability for food safety.
Several identification standards are established to identify products for global commerce. Universal Product Codes (UPC) and Global Standard (GS1) give products universal identification. Product bar codes provide identification and have demonstrated how we can capture relevant data almost effortlessly. Data capture, retention and expedient retrieval are paramount to food safety. The SQF audit will evaluate and monitor the food safety program to insure food safety.
How is it done at your facility?
Do you meet the auditor, clear the conference room and spread out the binders of paperwork you have for accumulated to illustrate your diligence to detail for traceability? Then the staff and auditor spend the next several hours /days reviewing documentation and putting together lot traceability. Minutes matter, how long will it take for an organization to have a list of customers they will need to call in the event of a product recall?
There is a better way! Update your data collection and create your traceability process with your daily activities. When you get call from someone not in your contact list, you click “add Contact” and all the extra information gets loaded by clicking “save contact”.
Build traceability into your process, capture data electronically and allow it to reside with the item and lots numbers. Scan and capture data from your everyday activities like purchase orders, work orders, and shipping orders then store it electronically. The process of data capture while doing the daily activities will allow an organization to be “Audit Ready” at any moment. However, traditional ERP and MRP systems treat inventory items in terms of units and cost. Single bin systems work well in all accounting and planning models but fall short for SQF traceability.
The NorthStar WMS is configured to the food processing industry will provide a solid database foundation for data storage and retrieval. Organizations need to know more about the inventory now more than ever. Recall information instantly to notify customers of a potential hazard and electronic traceability is the most efficient means to accomplish that goal.
Then when the auditor arrives at the organization just relax and simply run “The Ingredient Recall Report” for the item / lot number. In seconds, the lot number in question will list the complete life cycle of the lot number, how much is in stock, and list every product made with it, along with a list of every customer who bought it. Traditional paperwork systems cannot provide expedient results.
