Safe Food Factory is a not-for-profit organization (2014), aimed at establishing a community about hygienic production of Food, Feed and Pharma.
The food industry is very diverse. Over more than 130 different production processes are described on Safe Food Factory. Producers, policy makers, machine manufacturers, engineers and hygiene experts provide reliable and up-to-date information concerning codes of practice, products and process management.
The strengths of Safe Food Factory
- 24/7 access to current and reliable information
- Leading platform for food safety related knowledge
- The most active community within the food industry
One thing that all food production processes have in common is that foods must be produced in a safe way. High hygienic standards are essential. This requires that the machinery and equipment used in the food production processes are easy to clean. It is no longer sufficient to only remove the dirt visible to the naked eye. The production lines and facilities must be free of harmful microorganisms. These are invisible. Once the microorganisms are visible it is already too late.
This means that every part of your production line must be suitable to be cleaned on a microbial level. This can only be achieved if the design, implementation and verification of the process lines are devised with this form of thorough cleaning in mind. Furthermore, additional matters such as structural preventive maintenance, the correct way of producing and certified cleaning procedures are of great importance. Think of sound welding procedures, creating an appropriate surface structure and optimizing the corrosion resistance of contact materials.
Of course the microbial sensitivity of a food product plays a large role. Should a production line be aseptically or hygienically designed down to the smallest detail? This depends on the way in which the food is distributed (dry, chilled or frozen), its shelf life, and how the consumer handles the product at home (open shelf life). Legislation provides a number of framework laws that force both food producers and machine manufacturers to consider these issues.
The practical implementation of many of the subjects has received too little attention. Safe Food Factory fulfils a role as intermediary, a binding force. Safe Food Factory will share ideas with practical solution and brings together specialists to address inherent problems on various subjects. The government stimulates this approach by and within the sector.
Examples of Safe Food Factory initiatives are the national workgroups:
- Hygienic cabling
- Hygienic compressed air
- Hygienic welding
In addition to the maintaining the website, Safe Food Factory, together with several industry players, regularly organises seminars and workshops. This can be for particular areas of focus, such as recently organised for the Association for Cold Storage (KNVVK), or together with the Machine Manufacturing Group (GMV) and the Dutch Welding Institute (NIL) a workshop on hygienic welding.
Safe Food Factory is not satisfied with just an appealing story, but encourages thorough research. In the area of the website accessible to members only, research reports, including factual and verifiable data and material can be found.
Safe Food Factory also provides Engineering Handbooks for food companies to enable engineers, machine builders and installers to read up on the specific requirements with which their products or services have to comply. These manuals are directly linked to the current legal requirements and the relevant parts of the codes of practice.
All in all, Safe Food Factory is a knowledge platform by and for professionals in the food industry.
Safe Food Factory considers it important that its activities always comply with antitrust laws and believes that matters must be conducted in free competition. Safe Food Factory will therefore respect and comply with antitrust laws, and will constantly emphasise this among its participants.