Major advances in product inspection driven by regulatory demand

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Terry Woolford

By Terry Woolford, general manager, Eagle Product Inspection

Today technologically advanced machines identify a multitude of contaminants in a variety of foods, products and packages.

With ever-changing trends in the food industry, inspection equipment has evolved to meet the new demands that increasingly innovative packaging

designs are impacting on the inspection process.

A growing consumer trend affecting manufacturers is the desire for multitextured foods, such as bags of mixed salad leaves.

These types of packaged goods have many density levels resulting in a crowded image, posing new challenges for identifying contaminants.

Extra demands are being made on image analysis software to find contaminants. Material Discrimination (MDX) technology, Eagle X-Raywhich is especially useful with variable density “busy” images, is a good solution to this problem.

Originally pioneered for use in the security sector, MDX technology is able to discriminate materials by their chemical composition and allows the detection and rejection of historically undetectable inorganic contaminants such as glass shards, rocks, rubber and plastic.

New product inspection systems now come equipped with MDX dual-energy algorithms that increase contaminant detection of foreign bodies previously unseen by any other conventional means in difficult product applications.

New and innovative packaging designs, such as fold-out cardboard sandwich packaging and corrugated card encasements, have also brought their own challenges.

Machines previously calibrated to scan standard types of packaging have had to adapt to be able to accurately analyse new shapes, sizes and materials such as flexible packaging and pouches.Eagle X-Ray 2

Recent advancements in technology now enables inspection equipment to simultaneously perform a wide range of in-line quality checks such as verifying fill level, measuring headspace, and verifying component presence and absence to alert manufacturers to over- or under-fulfillment to avoid waste.

The blind spots that had previously occurred at the bottom of upright containers such as glass jars, bottles and composite lines are also easier to inspect today with machines that use enhanced contaminant detection technologies, such as MDX.

Goods in tin cans or foil pouches have also posed a problem for manufacturers when inspecting for metal contaminants within the container.

Detection of metal and foreign contaminants in food packaged within foil and metal is impossible with a conventional metal detector and so the development of metal detection technologies has made this achievable.Eagle X-Ray 3

Food and drug safety regulations, along with the requirements of large food retailers, have also been a driving force in the industry to improve inspection machinery.

Although there are no legal requirements to use inspection guidelines, such as Hazard Analysis Critical Control Point (HACCP), these have put the onus on manufacturers to establish reliable and fully documented product inspection programmes.

The HACCP management system addresses the inspection of food by analysing and controlling biological, chemical and physical hazards. It is used by manufacturers at all stages of food production and preparation processes including inspection, packaging and distribution (1).

As packaging continues to evolve to attract consumers, inspection machines will continue to progress in order to meet these ever-changing demands. Equally, as retailers demands increase and food and drug safety regulations intensify, compliance and traceability through every stage of a product’s life cycle will grow in importance.Eagle X-Ray 4

Eventually all product inspection equipment will need to be tailored to dually function as a management tool and food safety measure.

1 FDA: http://www.fda.gov/food/foodsafety/hazardanalysiscriticalcontrolpointshaccp/default.htm

For more information:

Eagle Product Inspection

Tel: +1 877 379 1670

Email: [email protected]

Visit: www.eaglepi.com

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