22 December 2016

Traceability of the product: What it is and why it is so important

In Transportes F. Ramos we take the traceability of the product very seriously. In fact, thanks to our comprehensive service and a thorough monitoring of the product, we can control at all times in which stage it is, what temperature it maintains and the logistic procedures that have been carried out. In this way we can ensure that all quality requirements have been respected during transport, from its origin to its final destination.

What is traceability?
Resultat d'imatges de trazabilidad alimentaria vino
"Traceability is the possibility of identifying the origin and the different stages of a process of production and distribution of consumer goods".

The Committee on Food Safety defines traceability as:

"The set of those pre-established and self-sufficient procedures that allow to know the history, the location and the trajectory of a product or batch of products along the supply chain at any given time, through certain tools."

Legislation
Food traceability, moreover, is subject to a set of European standards.

• Regulation (EC) 178/2002 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 28 January 2002 on food law, establishment of the European Food Safety Authority and the related procedures to be carried out. The regulation states that at all stages of production, processing and distribution, the traceability of food or any substance intended to be processed must be ensured.
• The Implementing Regulation (EU) 931/2011 contains a regulation published in the Official Journal of the European Union on September 20, 2011, which obliges producers and suppliers to provide information on food of animal origin supplied to food companies for distribution and consumption.

What is the purpose of food traceability?
Food traceability helps us:

• Provide greater food safety to the consumer.
• Detect quickly possible supply chain failures.
• Guarantee a high quality of the product thanks to the maintenance of all its properties.
• Reduce the deterioration of products, thanks to the control over its expiration.
• Control individually by lot and lot
• Improve stock management.
• Control the evolution of the product.
• Selectively remove products with any incidence.

Why is food traceability so important?
In the complex framework of globalization, where products continually change country and hands, it is very important to be able to control at all times where a particular lot is, how long it is there or under what conditions. In addition to ensuring greater food safety, traceability also brings great economic benefits to the company:

Imagine that a certain product line has been contaminated. If we did not have exhaustive control of each of the items, the company should withdraw all the products in circulation, for safety. However, thanks to food traceability, we can quickly determine the cause, which batches are infected and where they are found. In this way the economic impact of the company is greatly reduced, since we can selectively withdraw and not all products.