6 Food Quality Plant Maintenance Strategies to Improve Regulatory Compliance

The food and beverage manufacturing industry is notoriously difficult and demanding. Not only does it have razor-thin profit margins, but the industry is constantlyfacingnew challengestomeet increasingcustomer demands. Food manufacturers are also under constant regulation – and with good reason. Careless mistakes could lead to serioushealthandlegalconsequences. The only way to keep up is tokeep equipmentsanitary and properly functioningat all times.

In this article, we discuss the topplant maintenancechallenges faced bythe food and beverage industry, as well as6essentialstrategiestostrengthen preventive maintenance plansandensuresafety andregulatory compliance.

>Index

Top Food Quality Maintenance Challenges

6Essential Strategies to Ensure Regulatory Compliance

How Sigga Can Help

>Top Food Quality Maintenance Challenges

To maintain a competitive edge, thefood and beverage industry must staycurrentwith the latest in preventiveand predictivemaintenanceapproachesto maximize uptime andmaintain compliance.This ismore easily said than done as there are manyuniquechallenges toaddress and overcomeincluding:

>Keeping the Workplace Hygienic

Food and beverage manufacturers must maintain a hygienic workplace to avoid lawsuits, recalls, or food contamination. This situation requires the whole organization to be focused on sanitary practices. Cleanliness needs to be ingrained in the company culture. For the maintenance department, it adds extra procedures and extra steps to every task for food & beverage manufacturers.

Maintenance processes whether it is inspections or repairs can introduce contamination into the production line. From bacteria and random debris to flakes of rust and paint, the maintenance team needs to be aware of the potential issue and follow documented procedures to maintain hygienic conditions. In addition, safety must be considered as many cleaning requirements often result in a wet environment which can create a safety issue for workers and reduce the useful life of equipment.

>Avoiding Spoilage and Contamination

When equipment breakdowns,foodcan be contaminated or spoil until a repair can be completed. Thisimpact is more thanthe typical downtimeissuesoffinancial losses,staff idleness, andpotentialunsatisfied customers. The situationadds to the pressures and process steps for the maintenance organizationtoquicklydiagnose the problems and implement repairsto minimize the downtime event.

>AddressingMulti-layered ComplianceRegulations

The food and beverage industry is highly regulated since the products are intended for human consumption.For example, in addition to standard regulations for all manufacturers from organizations such as the Occupational Safety & Health Administration and the Environmental Protection Agency, U.S. food & beverage manufacturers need to address regulations from the Food & Drug Administration, the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the Hazardous Analysis and Critical Control Point (HACCP) organization and more.

And of course,many of theseorganizationsconductroutine andcomplaints-based inspections. So,it is critical to staycurrent with thelatestfood and beverage industry regulations and compliancerequirements.

The COVID-19pandemic has brought about many new regulations in food manufacturing plants, like reconfiguring the work environment to ensure social distancing, increasing cleaning and sanitation requirements,and reducing the number of onsite workers. The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA)together with the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA),released a recentchecklist for employee health and food safety, for food manufacturing plants to address these added regulations.

This challenge further drivesfood & beverage plants towardsmore advanced maintenance strategiesto support the continual change inprocedures and documentationrequiredto stay compliant.

>Sophisticated Equipment

There are many complex assets ina food processingplant that require constant maintenance from specially trained technicians.Many crafts are needed to address the range of failure modes and risk factors in the maintenance and repair of food and beverage production equipment. From high-speed conveyors, ovens, and coolers to bottling machines and end-of-line packers, the number of plant maintenance procedures become exponential.

Lisa Denney,reliability-centered maintenance facilitatorat Coors Brewing Co.,”found that when you adjust the mechanical systems of these machines, you can affect the electrical program, too,” she says. “So,you really need to have team of specialists – someone with a mechanical maintenance background and an electronics technician – who can work together on this equipment.”

Exacerbatingthis challengeistheshortage of skilled labor. It is difficult enough to schedule inspections and preventive maintenance tasks with the range of trades needed, but the problem also impacts the ability to quickly respond to breakdowns.

>LinkedProcesses andEquipment

The more machines used in the food productionand packagingprocessthemoreimportantpreventive maintenancebecomes.Chuck Armbruster, corporatereliability engineering managerat the J.M. Smucker Co. commented, “every time you add another piece of equipment on a production line, that’s another potential source for downtime. …As a result, all the machines need to be integrated and made reliable in order to get the finished goods out at the far end of the line.”

For the gain inbenefits of end-to-endproduction linesfor food quality andproductionefficiency,food & beverage plantsneed to increaseinvestmentsin good maintenance practices.

>Continuous Production

In the world of food production, machines are continuously running.Finding the right time to do inspections or routine maintenance can be challenging.But the downside of not completing preventive tasks can be devastating. Not only can unplanned downtime affect the entire production, but also runs the risk of shortening the machine’s useful life.

Even if condition monitoringisin place, actual preventive maintenance work is critical.Production and maintenance departments need to work closely together toalign on the maintenance plans andthe day-to-daymaintenance schedules.

>Tight Maintenance Budgets

The food manufacturing industry is a high-risk industry where operational efficiency is not an option but a necessity. With slim profit margins and the pandemiccreating swings in demand, the industry is feeling even more pressure. That said, it isevenmore challenging now to invest in better maintenance practices whereas theresult can be greater operationalefficiencyand cost savingsfor the whole production organization.

>6 Essential Strategies to Ensure Regulatory Compliance

Whilefood and beveragemanufacturers have to face plenty of challenges, there is nothing more challenging than keeping compliant. There are many ways for a food and beverage manufacturing company to fall out of complianceincluding failure tocontrol hygiene, cleanliness, pests, waste products, safety data sheets andeven failureofrecord-keeping.The impactcan besignificantfines,plantshutdowns, product recalls, customer complaints,bad press,and loss of business.

Below are 6 essential strategies to keep yourself compliant through proper maintenance.

6Maintenance Strategies for Regulatory Compliance

1. >Training
2. >Document Procedures
3. >Implement HygieneProtocols
4. >Excel at Work Management
5. >Condition Monitor
6. >Pursue Reliability-Centered Maintenance

> 1. Conduct Regular Training

Study after study findthat insufficient employee trainingisone of the top-ranked problemsfor food safety and compliance.You must train your maintenance team on the best practices in quality control, occupational safety, and food safety. More importantly, they must understand why it’s vital for the company and the consumer. You can solidify these best practices through regular training, so these are always top of mind.

Considercomparing your training practices with theseguidelines published by the University of Nebraskaregardinggood manufacturing practices. This study suggests the inclusion of targeted and ongoing training on issues, such as cleaning and sanitation procedures, allergen control, monitoring, and incoming ingredient receipt protocol, among others.

One way to reinforce training is tocompletely document procedures and make them easily available.

> 2. Document Procedures

Regulations like theHACCP require foodand beveragemanufacturers toindividuallydocument theirownmanufacturingand maintenancepractices to maintain food quality. Theseinstructions and guidelines need to cover every process from simple hand-washing procedures tohow to change a coupling.

Besides creating the documentation, it is important to make thepolicy and checklists availableto the right personat the point of the task.For example, you need a coupling replaced and have not given instructions to the technician on how to properly conduct the task.The technician completes the procedure, but the coupling seizes and fails within a few days. Then, a different technician repairs the coupling again, but is highly familiar with the procedure andnow the equipment is running fine. What if the coupling fails again? What is the risk ofassigning the right technician tocompletea long-term repair?Rather than take chances, documentationthat is easily accessible to every technician goes along wayto get it right every time.

Besides documenting your procedures, for compliance you need to document that procedures werefollowed, completed successfully and onthe appropriate time interval.Keeping data digital through-outthe maintenance processdown to the technician completingindividual tasksmakes it easy tocapturethe data for proof of compliance.

> 3. Implement Food Quality Maintenance Hygiene Protocols

Because food manufacturing and sanitation are inseparable, your maintenance team must ensure theyfollow all the same procedures as the production team. In addition, they need to be aware of the chemicals they useand the potential to contaminate foodwith grease, dirt, metal shavings etc. fromconductingmaintenance and repairs.

The choice of equipment and even parts can impact the lifetime of the assets, especially in wet environments.“In the course of doing ourReliability Centered Maintenance program, we found that equipment that is subjected to moisture and chemicals is much more likely to fail,” according to Lisa Denney, reliability-centered maintenance facilitator at Coors Brewing Co. “For instance, when we looked at gearboxes, we saw that those in the wet areas of the plant fell two years earlier than those in the dry areas.”

Maintenance training and documentation needs to be specific to the plant location and equipment to recognize and proactively avoid food contamination and maximize the lifetime of plant equipment.

>4. Excel at Work Management

Given the compliance requirements and the business need to optimize uptime, it is critical to be exceptionalinwork managementandtheplanning and schedulingof maintenance work.Assigning the right technician to the right tasks at the right timesnot only optimizes resourcesand improves uptime,but it will alsohelp with compliance management and reporting.

Using SAPPM for plantplanning and schedulingcan be tediousand slow. Yourmanagement team needs more data than what is available in SAP to createschedules to align preventive maintenance plans with production calendars and technician skills.Using an automation solutionwith SAP PM can replace the routinetime-consuming work while providing intuitive views to optimizeand manage maintenance schedules.

The result ofusing technology tooptimize SAP PMcan result inmore preventive maintenance work getting completed and betterutilization of the maintenance staff.Per Doc Palmer in hisMaintenance Planning andScheduling Handbook,”Implementing proper planningand scheduling can improve productive maintenance time (wrench time) of a typical organization from 25-35% to 50-55% – almost doubling the ability to get work completed.”

>5. Install Sensors and Condition Monitoring

Today’stechnology of smart machines and sensors can monitor the condition of assets andtriggeramaintenancenotification. Sensors can even recommend a change in productionto extend the use of the equipment until a repair can be scheduled.TheseIndustry 4.0 technologieshave been coming down in price and are not only forhigh-margin manufacturers. They can even pay for themselves by reducing the amount of preventive maintenance tasks required, avoiding breakdowns, and resulting downtime impacts.For example,sensorscanconductvibration analysis,sampleoilviscosity,detect temperature changes withinfrared thermography,monitor noises withultrasound.

These technologiescan predict a potential problembefore itcauses a failure.In many cases, production can solve an issue on their own without the need to notify the maintenance team.To take advantage of these technologies, you need tobe able to turn the data collected into insights andwork orders for themaintenance team. Itis insufficient tojust monitor,you need to havethework management processesto act on the data.

> 6. Pursue Reliability-Centered Maintenance Practices

Preventive maintenance is essential for food and beverage plants, butreliability-centered maintenancetakes it to the next level. Some assets are best left to run-to-failure, while otherswould benefit fromconstant monitoring. The general principle of reliability-centered maintenance is todeploy themost effective maintenance approachto everypiece of equipmentto maximize uptime and minimize maintenance costs.

Given the complexityand breadth of maintenance tasks for food & beverage manufacturers, reliability-centered maintenancepracticesnot only optimize maintenance work,but the data structure and practices underpinning this strategy supports compliance management and reporting.

In Conclusion

Jamie Borley CEng MSc CMRP MIAM, a chartered engineerandCertified Maintenance & Reliability Professionalframedthis up wellfor theProcessing Industry Informer, “Those food & beverage manufacturers, who are soaring and towering above all others, have realized that to keep ahead demands asset management strategic thinking and managing their maintenance with modern and pragmatic best practices. They are closing all the gaps in their maintenance processes andoptimizing their workflows. They realize the need for continuous improvement, and continuous evolution underpinned with mobile technology, solutions,and strategies.”

How Sigga Can Help

Sigga is an internationally recognized software company thathas been supportingmajorfood manufacturing industryclientsin their digital transformation initiativesfor the last 20 years.As the leading provider ofsolutions for SAP EAM, wehave a deep understanding of the obstacles and painsof themaintenance function.

We remain on top of the ever-changing technological advancements and offer best-in-class EAM products for complex integration and business scenarios. OurMobile EAMapp provides an interface to SAP PM for techniciansreplacing paper and manual data entry processes.The app supportstechnicians to follow compliance-based procedures with full access to manuals and checklistswhile online or offline. Plus,capturesreal-time datafor compliance reporting even allowing for custom forms to meet uniqueprocedure lists anddata capturerequirementsfor HACCP and other regulations.

OurPlanning and Schedulingsolutionautomates routine steps to free up managers toplan maintenance activities more strategically.The solution maintains data on planned equipment downtime, technician skills and detailedtechnicianavailability. The solution also trackspartsavailability including vendor turnaround time to supplytheparts needed.The interfacemakes it easy to adjust schedules, trackworkstatus andpull reports to support compliance requirements.

Here are some of our food and beverage manufacturing clients that have optimized their maintenance processesand improved compliance with our solutions.

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>Read more >about Sigga EAM solutions for SAP Plant Maintenance.