How to improve food safety: The importance of supply chain management

Bethan Foston Date published: Jun 14, 23

Maintaining food safety throughout the supply chain has never been more imperative. With the rise of global trade, food is often transported over long distances and exposed to a variety of different climates, bacteria, and other contaminants. By closely monitoring the production process and storage conditions of food products, supply chain operators can prevent contamination, spoilage, and food-related illnesses, thus protecting public health. In this blog, we outline the ways to improve food safety in your supply chain, providing actionable steps to help you achieve this goal.

What is Supply Chain Management?

Supply chain management (SCM) is the oversight of materials, information, and finances that are distributed through various channels before reaching the consumer. This involves controlling and orchestrating all of these activities throughout the process to improve customer satisfaction.

In the food supply chain, good management is vital in helping businesses better understand their customers and in identifying potential risks and opportunities. Unfortunately, guaranteeing that food products are protected and of the highest quality is not always a simple task, and suppliers have been known to take shortcuts; I mean, just look at the horse meat scandal for instance!

What is the impact of supply chain management on food safety?

Supply chain management has a major impact on food safety, as it encompasses all of the activities and processes necessary to ensure that food is handled and stored properly. Good supply chain management can ensure that food is delivered to the consumer in a safe and hygienic manner, and that food safety is maintained throughout the supply chain. Conversely, poor supply chain management can lead to food safety issues, such as contamination, spoilage, and foodborne illness.

How to improve food safety in the supply chain

Monitor your suppliers and be vigilant when choosing new ones to work with

Identifying and addressing any potential issues in your supply chain that could result in food contamination, spoilage or other food safety issues, is of the utmost importance. Not only is it essential for you to retain a pristine reputation, but more importantly, it is critical for the health and safety of your consumers. When it comes to choosing suppliers to work with, or auditing existing ones, there are certain criteria to evaluate.

• Request written records from suppliers regarding their health and safety policies, procedures, and audits
• Inquire about the origin and journey of ingredients
• Inquire about the Food Safety Management Systems in use such as their HACCP plans
• Verify that the supplier is compliant with all necessary food safety regulations through their local health department
• Confirm that food is labelled with the necessary allergy warnings and expiration dates
• Confirm that the supplier has insurance to cover potential food safety issues

From a safety perspective, a supplier approval system centralizes research and risk assessments on each individual supplier, allowing you to continuously monitor their performance, capture important data, and set frequent audit reminders. Maintaining an approved list of suppliers to source your raw materials will no longer just be a ‘tick box exercise’. Furthermore, from a business standpoint, eliminating your complex, manual supplier approval procedures will greatly reduce the amount of time spent on risk assessments whilst also decreasing the possibility of a major deficiency going unnoticed in a cramped Excel worksheet.

Regular audits

After taking careful consideration in choosing your supplier, it is recommended that you conduct a third-party audit. Auditing a potential supplier against their own standards is the best way to ensure food safety, helping you to pick up on issues that may have been overlooked or hidden. Although audits can produce a great deal of stress, this stress is a necessity when the alternative is tracking - well, attempting to track - supplier performance manually. Without clear data indicating which suppliers pose a food safety risk, there is no reliable way to distinguish between good suppliers and those that could compromise your food safety. This is especially true in a larger or more intricate supply chain.

Supplier approval SOP software is essential for food safety from farm to fork. It allows you to keep tabs on how suppliers are functioning and to make use data-driven dashboards to alert you in advance if a supplier's performance begins to decline.

Improve traceability of all products

Tracking the journey of food from its source to the point of consumption is essential. If a foodborne illness outbreak were to occur, you want to pinpoint the source quickly and ensure the spread is contained. Traceability of food in the supply chain also provides an efficient way to identify and recall any contaminated items.

A digital food management system should be implemented to ensure the traceability of finished products right back to their raw material states. This system should record the batch codes of all ingredients in production records. Additionally, transit packaging and labelling for all intermediate products should include product descriptions, time/shift/date, and codes. The benefit of a digital system? Advanced analytics can identify any emerging issues in a certain product or batch, detecting problems long before a manual system would.

An automated ‘HACCP’ approach

Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Point (HAPPC) is a systematic approach to food safety that identifies potential hazards and implements preventative measures to minimise the risk of contamination in food production. By following HACCP principles, food businesses can reduce the risk of foodborne illness, improve the safety of their products, and protect their customers.

Automating food safety processes helps you to promptly close any non-conformances identified, whether you’re online or offline, at your desk or on-the-go. Another best practice is addressing the root cause of any issue. You should take the appropriate steps to not only ensure that issues do not recur, but also to determine whether the removal of the non-conformance will have any knock-on effects on other procedures or processes.

Keep your staff on the same page

This can be one of the biggest challenges in the food manufacturing industry, especially in larger organisations with an intricate supply chain. It is an immense job keeping track of the necessary training for each department, as well as where your learning gaps may be, due to the various requirements and regulations that exist across different business areas.

The integration of a document and knowledge management system not only streamlines distribution of the latest protocols or recalls, but also helps to facilitate communication between stakeholders in the supply chain, ensuring that any changes to food safety standards are quickly shared and implemented. Plus, thanks to automatic version numbering, the circulation of outdated processes is a thing of the past. It's no revelation that investing in technology is fundamental and, some would argue, the only way forward. Technology certainly has its place in improving food safety and to make certain your staff remain on top of current requirements.

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