Archive for the ‘Sourcing Safe Products’ Category

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The USDA attempts to make school lunches safer.

Monday, February 8th, 2010

Have you ever heard the phrase ?A camel is a horse created by committee?? Well read on.

According to a February 5th article by Blake Morrison and Peter Eisler of USA TODAY titled School lunch safety shored up, The United States Department of Agriculture or the USDA announced steps to ?assure the safety and quality food? purchased for the National School Lunch Program.

This author discussed this subject in a post on 12/10/2009 titled I loved school lunches and in a related post on 01/21/2010 titled Where?s the Beef and how do we trace it? As my previous posts point out this is not just a beef problem, a recall management problem, a poultry problem (spent hens) or a traceability problem. It is all of the above and more.

Beyond what the USDA can do and what meat packers and processors can do is what the schools can also do. From a pure sourcing perspective, the question is are our schools just buying what the government has to sell in terms of commodities or are they actually asking questions as to where the products came from, how they were grown and what standards the growers and processors are beings held accountable to.

In another post titled Food Safety requires a community effort I quoted President Obama as having said ?There are certain things only a government can do. And one of those things is ensuring that the foods we eat are safe and do not cause us harm.? So congratulations to the USDA for stepping up. But let?s remember that it is a community effort and as procurement professionals we can not let our guard down just because another program comes along.

Our children and our communities are counting on us.

We look forward to and appreciate your comments.

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Try buying products and services that are safe and support the environment.

Wednesday, January 27th, 2010

Do consumers have the right to expect products, services and other finished goods they purchase from their retailers to be safe and eco friendly?

If so, what level of safety should they expect? Does safety extend beyond the personal safety of their families, pets and loved ones to the ecological impact the manufacturing of these products has on our planet? Who should bear the expense of this increased safety; suppliers, retailers, or consumers? Are there more effective ways in the form of better processes and more modern easy to use tools to reduce costs and increase safety and eco awareness?

A Consumer?s Perspective:

Many baby boomers remember listening to the nightly news as children and young adults and hearing the local anchor person ask the following question. ?It?s 10 o?clock. Do you know where your children are??

In those days, it was fair question. Prior to the development of pagers, cell phones, personal digital assistants smart phones, and Apples newest offering the question challenged parents to be accountable for their children and insure that they were safe. Today, a simple text message or phone call provides some level of security to parents, albeit not the level of safety one might like. But, do we know how the safe the products we consume and use are? Toy recalls, pet food recalls, tainted drugs, many food born illness outbreaks from salmonella to e.coli, melamine, BPA issues, children?s jewelry. The list grows daily.

The question consumers are asking retailers more often these days is how safe is your supply chain? That?s because every retailer has a similar but different supply chain.? Consumers are interested as to what level their retailer understands where their products come from??? The Public Health Security and Bioterrorism Preparedness Act of 2002 was fully enacted in 2004. It requires processors, distributors, importers and other reseller groups in the United States to maintain records that identify the immediate sources that they receive food from and the recipients they send it to. There are any number of other laws and standards we discuss in this post regularly covering virtually every product made.

Should consumers have anything to worry about and if so what risk does this pose for retailers? Visit us tomorrow for some answers.

We appreciate and look forward to your comments.

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This author loves all kinds of Salami. Is it traceable?

Monday, January 25th, 2010

Rose said, ?toughie (their nick name for me) get out of the Salami?. I had this bad habit of reaching in the refrigerator (possible contamination) and taking 5 or 6 slices that had been cut in half for pizza and stuffing them in my mouth all at once. The Salami was either Genoa or Volpi or some other top quality brand. I did not even know where it came from and I?m sure that neither Rose nor Margaret (both from Italy) the proprietors could trace it either.

Today I live in Arizona. We have a few good Italian eateries here but not a very large Italian community. I was reading the Arizona Republic today when an article jumped out at me titled R.I. Company recalls salami. This article was attributed to the Associated Press. Being as Rhode Island is very close to Boston and also has a great Italian section called Federal Hill and the subject was salami I read on. As you are aware, my most recent post was also on product safety and traceability, titled Procurement Professionals can aid in product safety adherence.

The article went on to say that a Rhode Island meat company had recalled 1.24 million pounds of pepper coated salami after month?s long investigation of a salmonella outbreak that sickened 184 people in 38 states by comparing shopping receipts of those who got sick. This certainly supports one forward and one back accountability from a retailer?s perspective but this author is not sure that the intention of the rule is to have to chase down receipts which is extremely time consuming, costly and a strategy that provides the possibility of an extremely limited sample.

The definition of traceability according to Wikipedia refers to the completeness of the information about every step in a process chain. Traceability is the ability to verify the history, location, or application of an item by means of documented recorded identification. Doing this systematically is where the retail industry needs to be.

This author has discussed this in numerous previous posts. One of my favorites is from September of 2008 titled Traceability-also-requires-sensibility-if-you-want-a-safe-supply-chain.? So what can you do as a retailer? Begin by asking your e-procurement solutions provider how they address traceability with their tools.

We look forward to and appreciate your comments.

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Procurement Professionals can aid in product safety adherence.

Friday, January 22nd, 2010

An article in today?s Arizona Republic attributed to the associate press was titled 1.5 million strollers recalled. The reason for the recall was canopy hinges causing fingertip amputations.? The article went on to mention that this was the 2nd major recall of strollers in recent months. In November of 2009 about one million strollers were recalled for fingertip amputation by the hinge mechanism from another manufacturer.

This author is aware that we can control the substances that go into these products from raw materials perspective but how do we in fact make sure they are safe for the children riding in them or the people pushing them.

The first thing we can do is ensure that the products are tested by Consumer Product Safety Commission or other groups with authority for that product. Last year the CPSC? announced that they would be expanding and modernizing the agency?s testing facilities with a new facility, located off the ?I-270 Technology Corridor? in Rockville, Md. One of the roles of the new facility is to provide additional space for CPSC?s Laboratory and Engineering Sciences Teams to test and evaluate consumer products.

You may be able to locate information about the products you procure at the Consumer Product Safety Commission?s website area for regulations and laws, but it will take some digging if you have never been there before. The product may have a FEDERAL HAZARDOUS SUBSTANCES ACT to support it as do a number of baby and children products.

What appears to be common sense to this author is in addition to holding companies accountable to regulations is also to simply ask what type of testing a product has gone through and where it was manufactured? Most companies have great intentions for the products they manufacture and sell. We may be able to keep our children safer by simply asking some logical questions.

We look forward to and appreciate your comments.

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