How to boost post-pandemic commercial processing

So, the effects of COVID-19 & social distancing have impacted your operations and there’s uncertainty in the industry…

What does the future of commercial post harvest processing look like?

Businesses worldwide have been heavily affected by the pandemic

and post pandemic regulations - Securing future trade and enhancing your operation is your current agenda

Preparation of vegetables for the ready-to-eat sector has always been an expensive problem, Balancing supply with demand when processing for the fresh market, takes experience, knowledge and careful planning

Typically, the processing industry relies heavily on hand labour and for many of the post harvest processing stages, this requires large hand cutting lines for each crop; Yield to through-put ratio is always the bottom line and the cost of hand-labour is escalating

Industry standard regulations for facilities operating with hand-labour are very stringent, but a new problem exists…… Do you relax post-pandemic distancing precautions to keep up with consumer demand - It’s difficult to achieve social distancing inside a processing facility and employee safety / hygiene cannot be fully guaranteed in enclosed spaces

Extractacore enhances your position in the marketplace

When analysing production data, you ideally want to see a high figure in the yield column and a very low figure in the waste column

Consistently processing 110/120 heads per min and achieving 95/97% product yield with 5% or less waste is an exciting prospect for any facility - this is the norm with our systems, but would be a fairly cost prohibitive exercise with hand-labour

Using automation to de-core vegetables will give your process more accuracy, limit excessive trimming and mitigate outer leaf loss - You can cut food loss and get an overall yield advantage, plus usable product is not being wasted anymore, it’s in the bag!

It’s all about automation

Now, analyze your throughput cost for Hand labour -V- Automation…

The benefits of automated de-coring in labour intensive crops like broccoli, cauliflower, lettuce and cabbage are clear, and value prop’ is a no brainer

With hand-labour you know that cross contamination is always a factor

You know that hand-labour is in sporadic supply and you also know the cost of employing hand-labour doesn't just equate to paychecks - escalating on-costs have to be factored in…

True, labour supply may ease in time, but the cost won’t and neither will

cross contamination

Even before coronavirus altered the way many of us work… Automation was a favourable path to increasing yield, increasing through-put and lowering food loss rates in commercial processing, so that major savings in disposal/transport of waste are immediate

There are tough decisions to be made, post harvest plant automation is here and processing facilities investing in automation will operate viably, with raised supply capacity at a lower cost and most importantly, provide safe uncontaminated produce for the consumer......

Consumer confidence in your product is paramount