Optimization of the quality assurance process for the marketing of NB oysters

Final Report

Maison BeauSoleil (2010) Inc

AIMAP 2011-G06

PROJECT SUMMARY

Thanks to a quality product, an innovation-focused development vision and a concerted marketing effort, Maison BeauSoleil Inc was able to position itself as one of the key players in the North American oyster market. It is only a matter of time before traceability becomes a regulatory requirement. If the company wants to maintain its competitive position and break into new markets, it will have to meet international standards. It believes it must take advantage of digital technologies to increase its productivity and production capacity as well as the quality of its product, if it seeks to maintain, or even increase, its competitiveness and break into new markets.

The fall season is particularly problematic in terms of oyster processing because of the heavy volume at that time of year. Because the company receives shellfish from more than 40 suppliers along the east coast of NB and from other Maritime provinces, it can receive deliveries from various producers simultaneously, as well as several daily deliveries from the same producer, which can lead to bottlenecks in the raw material receiving area. It is therefore interested in developing an oyster processing line to automate the steps involved in receiving, washing and storing live oysters, which can be incorporated into the product's traceability process.

More specifically, the purpose of the project is to:

• integrate digital technologies into the various production stages to improve the company's quality assurance process and productivity by creating an automated traceability system and improving oyster processing with respect to product reception.

Introduction

Given its expansion in recent years, the oyster industry is becoming a significant economic stakeholder for rural communities on NB's east coast. Maison BeauSoleil understands the challenges involved in the industry's development and the anticipated increase in production volume in traditional markets, and is currently working to extend its distribution network. It has specifically targeted the European market because of the anticipated increase in demand following the massive annual oyster mortalities in France, which is the largest consumer in the European community. The high price of the Canadian oyster, which is associated with high production costs and the distance of the markets, nonetheless presents an obstacle to the development of this new market, as does the regulatory requirements for product traceability. If the company wants to maintain its competitiveness and open new markets, it will have to improve its productivity to reduce production costs and ensure that its quality process meets or exceeds Canadian and target country regulatory requirements in terms of food safety and traceability. Accordingly, in a strategic planning exercise, the company identified the computerization of its traceability and the automation of reception/holding tank procedures as priorities for improving its productivity and product quality. The number of suppliers makes the approach difficult without the use of computer technologies. Add to that the congestion experienced during heavy periods (fall season) which is particularly burdensome given that most producers try to harvest their oysters at the end of the growing season between September and November before the ice forms. In addition, the company must supply the fall markets while at the same time build up inventory to be stored over the winter months. To this end, Maison BeauSoleil is equipped with three refrigerated storage areas, a holding tank system and two at-sea storage sites; it also has overwintering agreements with certain producers, which adds to the complexity of the traceability process. Plants face several challenges in administering all these aspects. The whole process is managed by hand, which poses a major risk of error. Significant challenges include administrative costs, as well as the visibility required for monitoring inventory, tracking batch history and maintaining batch integrity. Up to 70% of the company's oyster volume arrives at the plant between mid-September and early November; this can lead to:

• problems arising from the refrigerated storage units being at full capacity and increased risk of error in identifying and monitoring batches (traceability);
  
• greater risk of injury associated with work overload and excessive physical demands placed on staff;
  
• increased risks of losses due to longer wait times for storage in holding tanks;
  
• risk of post-storage losses as a result of poorly-washed oysters, which can lead to an excess of organic matter in the holding tanks and a reduction in water quality;
  
• risk of oysters in holding tanks being contaminated by bacteria from sediment;
  
• anticipated negative effects on the oysters' shelf life.

BUSINESS CASE

Computerizing the traceability process

The quality system is key to BeauSoleil's oyster marketing strategy. Oyster quality is measured based on a set of factors at each step of the production process, whether it be during the use of culture techniques, processing, storage, quality assurance, sanitation, or in terms of customer service. Sanitation and traceability are therefore key elements in processing and may be optimized through the computerization of the traceability process. Traceability and quality begin with the producers and are addressed through culture quality assurance agreements. The company and some of its producers are currently collaborating with the New Brunswick Professional Shellfish Growers Association to develop a pilot project to implement Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs) in the New Brunswick shellfish growing industry. SOPs are a series of procedures designed as a framework to help New Brunswick shellfish growers to evaluate and ensure the security, safety and quality of their products and activities. Procedures 13 (Grading at harvest and preparation for market) and 14 (Managing sales / customer care procedure) are particularly relevant to the traceability system that the organization wishes to develop.

It is only a matter of time before traceability becomes a requirement in Canada. It is already a regulatory requirement in Europe (Article 18 – General Food Law Regulation (EC) 178/2002), a market into which the company hopes to expand. It is also essential that the company meet international standards if it wishes to maintain its competitive position and break into new markets, considering that our oysters are higher in price than those on the European market and that this market is far away. The company could therefore capitalize on its strengths and take advantage of its quality assurance process; this is why the traceability process must be improved. The company already has a manual traceability procedure. However, the operation is labour intensive due to production levels and the amount of reporting. A traceability approach for a given batch could take upwards of an hour depending on product volumes and distribution. As a result, there would be a noticeable risk of error in situations where time was of the essence. Computerizing the traceability process could lead to significantly shorter timelines for the preparation of reports.

Improving productivity and maintaining product quality

Every fall, the company is flooded with oyster deliveries due to the nature of culture activities, demand and environmental constraints. Six additional employees must be hired in the fall to wash the oysters at receiving and transfer them to holding tanks. However, the addition of these extra employees cannot compensate for the work overload brought on by the fall's increased volumes, which leads to congestion in reception and dry storage areas. This situation justifies the implementation of a production line to automate the step of receiving and transferring oysters into holding tanks. Such a development would allow the company to improve its productivity to decrease production costs while increasing its daily capacity in order to respond to the increased workload and demand during heavy periods.

PROJECT OBJECTIVES

The company seeks to optimize its quality assurance process and productivity by integrating digital technology into its product's traceability, and by automating the production line components it deems top priority in order to increase its competitiveness on the North American market and position itself in new markets.

1. The project aimed to develop a computerized process for ensuring oyster traceability from the farm to the consumer while employing the Lean Manufacturing approach to maximize benefits in order to:
   • maintain high standards for quality;
     
   • decrease production costs and increase productivity;
     
   • introduce data collection, management and analysis tools to promote more effective management of the various production steps, specifically packaging.
2. The project also aimed to develop a production line to mechanize and automate the step of washing the oysters at receiving and load them into holding tanks, in order to:
   • ensure the traceability of the product as soon as it arrives at the plant;
     
   • reduce wait times for loading oysters into holding tanks;
     
   • reduce the work load (physical effort) for employees;
     
   • increase productivity;
     
   • lower production costs;
     
   • increase the holding tank support capacity, and
     
   • lengthen the shelf life of the oysters.

DESCRIPTION OF PROJECT ACTIVITIES

Shellfish traceability computer system

The initial approach was intended to adapt a traceability system initially developed for the lobster processing industry to the oyster processing industry. With that in mind, an analysis of the process was first carried out to attempt to understand the operational procedures and identify the company's oyster processing needs. Touch screen control panels and various operational modules were installed in the plant and configured according to the various posts and computers in order to integrate them into the flowchart. Trials were conducted in the plant over one month at the beginning of the season by company staff to validate the approach in an operational setting. The approach should make it possible to make any changes deemed necessary for the proper functioning and optimization of the system's performance.

The first trials revealed significant operational deficiencies (certain incompatibilities) in the first version of the plant's current traceability system. Although changes were made to the system over the summer to fulfil oyster processing needs and address operational constraints, the deficiencies were too significant and the flowchart was insufficient. The system ultimately required a major overhaul: algorithms were changed and operating procedures were redefined to address the specifications of the oyster processing operation while seeking to simplify the approach. For example, with a view to monitoring individual production performance, the use case diagram—initially intended to identify each box of oysters at packaging—was reviewed. The approach was deemed too difficult and restrictive to apply and not very cost-effective, especially for the small packages. The time between the product's reception, processing and shipping, in addition to the fact that the product's reception is based on estimates rather than exact values, further complicates programming. However, the most problematic factors that led the service provider to review the system in detail were the problems associated with the operating system updates used by the company for its software. Every update of the operating system resulted in incompatibilities with each change made to the traceability system.

The number of control panels for monitoring batches was reduced on the production line whereas management posts were added to the quality controller and secretariat. The packaging control panel was deemed unnecessary given that this step was being eliminated for the monitoring of each employee's performance. The control panel located in warehouses used for the finished product is used to monitor the various batches after packaging; this includes storage and shipping areas. A batch monitoring panel includes a bar code printer and reader as well as a touch screen and keyboard. The control panels were programmed to assign a bar code to every batch that enters the plant, to be able to enter information regarding that batch and possibly modify and read that information. A mobile reception post was added to the truck for the delivery of oysters to company suppliers. The post includes a tablet for saving batches and a printer to produce a receipt for the producer. The tablet makes it possible to photograph each batch and is programmed so that information can be transferred automatically into the company's computerized traceability system as soon as oysters arrive at the plant.

The 14-character bar code is assigned to the batch as soon as it is delivered to the producer or plant. In order to identify each batch, bar code labels are printed upon product reception. This bar code follows the product throughout the production line until it reaches the client. The code makes it possible to identify each batch according to supplier, production region, culture site and reception date. Changes are planned to make it possible to add comments at the time of reception to allow for better inventory and production management and to manage risk relating to product safety. Other comments such as the proportion of oysters by size group, level of siltation and marine biofouling, oyster temperature upon delivery and culture conditions and techniques could be relevant for inventory management. A second bar code, based on the initial code, is also given at each stage of the handling process, which enables the product to be tracked along the entire production line and for all handling to be documented. Comments can be added to the batch information throughout the process, making it possible to, among other things, manage product safety risk (results of samples for bacteriological analysis of product). By entering the initial bar code, managers can get an accurate picture of each batch's history.

The research can be refined to identify the finished product's distribution to its various distributors in the event the company wanted to implement a recall procedure. As for the traceability report, a second report could be added to the first to present information on combined orders (client order filled with more than one batch). Production reports can also be produced for each supplier, each batch, each day and each shift in addition to inventory reports for the various storage areas and other activities management and inventory tracking reports.