Tues 18th Nov, Park Plaza Westminster Bridge, London

IMPORTANT UPDATE: GUIDANCE ON GB-NI LABELLING REQUIREMENTS AND THE RETAIL MOVEMENT SCHEME PUBLISHED

Posted on by Neesha Ramsingh-Cleary

Defra have today published guidance and a policy paper on elements of the Windsor Framework. The published guidance covers the Retail Movement Scheme (or ‘ReMoS’ as it will otherwise be known), and guidance on the GB-NI labelling requirements for businesses using the Retail Movement Scheme.

Please see the notes below from Defra, which summarise the key elements within the publications:

Retail Movement Scheme:

If your business moves agri-food retail goods to Northern Ireland for sale and for final consumption, then you are eligible to join ReMoS and take advantage of simplified processes for moving those goods. As your supply chain evolves there is flexibility to join and leave the scheme.

Online registration for the scheme will open on 1 September 2023. Qualifying traders and businesses will be able to register at any point after this time. Registration will be simple, and you will only need to do it once, alongside accepting the scheme’s terms and conditions. Registration will ensure that Government has all the necessary information to admit you to ReMoS and allow you take advantage of simplified movements into Northern Ireland.

Businesses who wish to do so can pre-register for ReMoS between 31 July and 24 August 2023. This will fast-track scheme membership.

Under ReMoS, a simplified single document (the ‘General Certificate’) will confirm that all of the goods on a single truck are compliant with the terms of the scheme. You will no longer need to complete individual Export Health Certificates (EHCs) for each consignment, nor require signing off from a vet.

To assist you with any changes for your business, we are taking care to ensure that the end-to-end process is as straightforward as possible, drawing on existing industry standards and common practices to minimise additional burdens wherever possible.

Under the scheme you will be able to move more products to Northern Ireland than was possible under the original terms of the Northern Ireland Protocol. Bans on products like chilled meat preparations, and certain goods from the Rest of the World, such as South American avocados have been lifted. Further explanation and full list of products are outlined within Retail Movement Scheme: how the scheme will work – GOV.UK (www.gov.uk).

Labelling:

This guidance covers labelling rules for businesses in Great Britain (England, Scotland and Wales) and retailers in Northern Ireland, for those agri-food products moved under the Retail Movement Scheme.

Under the Retail Movement Scheme, some food products will need individual product labels with the words ‘Not for EU’. These requirements will be brought in through three phases from October 2023 to July 2025. The guidance gives more information on what products are exempt from the product-level labelling requirements.

Where products are not individually labelled with the words ‘Not for EU’, there are requirements to label the box or crate under the Windsor Framework. This requirement will take effect from 1 October 2023. It is recognised that businesses move products in different ways. Therefore, this requirement should be implemented in the most pragmatic way possible and we will continue to work with business on the practical methods that can be used to meet this requirement. Some acceptable examples are outlined in the guidance.

The UK Government will provide financial support to help businesses with the new labelling requirements in phase 1. Funding will cover a range of activities that could help your business meet the labelling requirements. The funding will not cover the labelling changes for phases 2 and 3.

Further details on the guidance can be found here.

Action: You should continue to use guidance and procedures that presently are in place on gov.uk. Guidance will be updated periodically, giving you time to prepare for any new requirements. For up-to-date guidance we encourage you to sign up for gov.uk alerts. 

 

Keeping you informed:

We will continue to update on the new Windsor Framework at our weekly agri-food forum and roundtables and encourage you to attend. The Forum is open to all traders. If you would like to attend and do not already have the invite, please email us at: NIGBFoodSupplyChainForum@defra.gov.uk

Defra will continue to keep you informed and up to date on developments that affect traders moving goods from Great Britain to Northern Ireland.

Should you have any questions or queries about this in the meantime, please email us at traders@defra.gov.uk.

FOOD FRAUD RESILIENCE SELF-ASSESSMENT SURVEY

Posted on by Neesha Ramsingh-Cleary

The National Food Crime Unit (NFCU) are collecting feedback on the Food Fraud Resilience Self-Assessment for the purpose of improving the tool and helping businesses to prevent food crime.

They have created an anonymous survey for you to provide feedback and offer your suggestions on how they could improve the tool.

All results are collected anonymously, and data will not be shared with any third parties outside of the Food Standards Agency (FSA).

The survey can be accessed here.

If the link above doesn’t work, copy and paste the following URL into your web browser:

https://forms.office.com/Pages/ResponsePage.aspx?id=-VAcircBikym-pDrkG8Y6WlZg1jPZRdDi2i80C29LMJUMUJBREdWMkpNSFJSVU4yUTRUQ0pUTU5ZTi4u

Please ensure you have completed the Food Fraud Resilience Self-Assessment before you complete the survey.

The survey is open for responses until 7th July 2023.

BFFF TECHNICAL EXPERT GROUP MEETS ONCE AGAIN TO REVIEW LATEST INDUSTRY DEVELOPMENTS

Posted on by Neesha Ramsingh-Cleary

The BFFF Technical Expert Group met on June 7th at the Newark Showground, in Lincolnshire, to review and discuss the very latest developments in key areas affecting our members.

But before we launched into the packed agenda, we couldn’t miss the opportunity to celebrate with the group by showing off our ‘Best Trade Organisation for 2023’ trophy which we were awarded at the Food Management Today Industry Awards in London the night before. We are absolutely thrilled to have been recognised for our efforts, and a big thank you goes out to those who nominated us.

The meeting was well attended, as always, and the group managed to work its way through several ‘meaty’ subjects, sharing very relevant insight and thoughts on such things as the Border Target Operating Model, GB-NI Trade, mechanically separated meat, and the recent apparent rise in Listeria incidents.

We were then joined by the National Food Crime Unit (NFCU) who presented us with an overview of their work, investigatory powers, and advice. It was also interesting to hear about some of their case studies, where months of tireless work have resulted in exposing and successfully prosecuting serious and organised criminality.
Please do look out for updates from the NFCU on our website and appearing in the BFFF Technical and Legislative newsletters. The unit also has a quarterly industry newsletter which shares current information on food fraud and the work of the NFCU which you may wish to subscribe to NFCU.Prevention@food.gov.uk

As the meeting is conducted under Chatham House rules, we will be unable to share the full minutes outside of the group, but please feel free to contact deniserion@bfff.co.uk should you want to discuss anything further.

GALA DINNER DANCE AND FROZEN FOOD AWARDS SUPPORTED BY BFFF MEMBERS

Posted on by Neesha Ramsingh-Cleary

With the BFFF Gala Dinner Dance and Frozen Food Awards mere days away, we would like to acknowledge the gracious support of some of our members, without whom our fantastic events would not be possible.

This year, we were pleased to have the support of Seara as our main Headline and Frozen Food Awards sponsor. Equally important were our other event sponsors which include: Birds Eye Ltd, Daregal Gourmet, Dawsongroup Temperature Control Solutions, Freiberger UK, Fullers Foods.  Our Gala Dinner Brochure, which will be handed out on the night was kindly sponsored by Inspired PLC our official logistics partner for the awards this year was Cook Trading Ltd.

Your support enables us to deliver top industry events fostering outstanding networking opportunities as well as collaboration and development of the frozen food industry.

There are still a few tickets left so book yours now. BOOK TICKETS HERE

To express an interest in supporting future BFFF events, contact our Events Manager Charley Price

WMS AND ROBOTICS

Posted on by Rob Sherwin

The growth in robotics and automation in the warehouse and wider supply chain is accelerating. The ever-increasing demand to make the best possible use of resources and emergence of new technologies are driving a surge in demand. What if any are the implications for warehouse management software (WMS) and associated applications?

Robotics and automation in the warehouse are not new. Conveyor and sortation systems have been around for decades. AGVs (autonomous guided vehicles) have been available for almost as long but were initially relatively expensive. Robotic arms are commonplace in manufacturing and, increasingly, logistics applications. Even humble lift trucks and order pickers have evolved to incorporate functions such as automatic lift height selection which enable a degree of “automation” and features such as wire-guidance and digital motors which help them integrate with other technologies.

The majority of this automation equipment was designed to fulfil repetitive tasks in a fixed position or a specific and well-defined area. The difference now is “autonomy” with many of the recent advances being in equipment that can operate on its own and move freely around a facility. Costs have decreased while advances in applications and supporting technologies have made it possible to integrate solutions more easily while meeting many more requirements. At the same time, with real estate prices and labour costs increasing, there is the constant pressure to make the best possible use of infrastructure and people, and maximise capacity, throughput, efficiency, and productivity. In short, the investment required can be more easily justified in a much wider range of settings.

The impact is stark. In its Intralogistics Robots 2023  study, MMH magazine found that 43% of companies who took part planned to use robots within the next three years. Only 4% said they had no plans to use robots, suggesting that over time almost every warehouse will be using them one way or another. While these figures are largely based on responses from US-based companies, the UK and Europe will not be far behind, especially as the business pressures may be even more intense here. In any case it is clearly one of the leading trends in the supply chain at the moment. MMH also reports that Gartner predicts 75% of large warehouses will be using some form of robotics by 2026 and that Mordor Intelligence predicts the market for warehouse robotics will be $23bn by 2027. Elsewhere, logistics giant DHL estimates that up to 30% of its global material-handling equipment fleet will use some form of robotic automation by 2030.  Data Bridge Market Research estimates that the value of the Global Robotic Arm Market will reach $75bn by 2029, treble the value in 2019.

Supply chain robotics and automation falls into two broad categories. The first is equipment installed in a fixed position in the warehouse. This includes, for example, conveyor, carousel, and sortation systems, as well as pallet wrappers, crane/tower systems, and pick-and-place robots. There are other examples and in most cases these systems or devices carry out their repetitive duties as part of the wider materials handling infrastructure. Many have their own control systems and applications which allow them to integrate with other systems. WMS, for example, commonly interface with these systems to oversee stock management and order picking.

The second, and one attracting all the interest at the moment, is the autonomous or free-ranging robot. These include autonomous lift trucks, AGVs, shelf-stacking lifts, and self-driving dollies for handling items such as trolleys, picking bins, and pallets. In the wider supply chain context, delivery buggies and drones fulfil a similar role and are an increasingly familiar sight in urban areas. Many of these technologies are replacing the more traditional type of warehouse operations that relied on human labour.

What does this mean for the WMS? At a simplistic level, a WMS issues an instruction to move an item from point A to point B and the “system” works out how to do it. From a WMS perspective the information required to manage the flow of items through the warehouse is more or less the same whether they are handled by conventional or automated equipment. Despite achieving often very high levels of accuracy, and no matter how well designed, systems which incorporate people-based interactions always contain a risk of human-error. Properly configured automated processes, on the other hand, should eliminate such potential errors and deliver even higher levels of accuracy and speed. However, this assumes that information is correct at all stages of the supply chain which is not always the case. Therefore, additional checks may be required before items enter the “automated” sections of the supply chain to minimise subsequent errors and WMS may need to incorporate new/different exception handling capabilities to capture the small number of errors that remain.

With fixed-position equipment the tasks involved are repetitive and relatively predictable. The control systems work with the WMS to work out what to do, in real-time and with high levels of accuracy. Things can be more complex if there is a choice or decision to be made. This might be the case, for example, if manual and automated picking are taking place simultaneously. In this example, the WMS and robotic equipment should work together to “decide” which is the most efficient way to complete the pick. Much if not all of this can itself be automated or pre-programmed with the decisions made by the systems based on predetermined rules or logic. For example, if a single item needs to be picked quickly for rapid despatch the best option could well be to instruct an operative to complete the task. Or it might not be. The point is, a well-designed and configured system will be able to make this type of decision based on its underlying programming, perhaps using a growing and evolving knowledge base of historic data. In other words, the system learns over time (sometimes a very short time) what is the best solution to any given new task. None of this is rocket science in the WMS world and many systems work this way. But the emergence of new forms of AI could take this decision making in new directions because the underlying systems will identify new patterns and be able to respond more flexibly than current systems.

Most operators with an existing facility will see the biggest benefit from automating certain aspects of their warehouse, most likely the high-volume and fast-moving areas. WMS such as ProWMS enterprise-level Advanced Warehouse Management have the inherent flexibility to support whatever processes (and changes) the operator decides. Ideally this will be achieved with minimal recoding. However, with its own modular design, ProWMS allows operators to add new functions and processes such as voice, pick-and-pack and so on whenever they choose rather than expecting them to specify a fully featured application from day one. This modular model also sits well with a rapidly evolving ecosystem such as we are currently seeing with new types of robots and automation. This is because creating a new module typically avoids the complexities of reworking a larger, non-modular code base.

References:

 

MMH 2023: https://www.mmh.com/article/warehouse_automation_survey_2023_more_robots_are_coming_to_a_warehouse_near_you

 

DHL: https://www.dhl.com/global-en/delivered/ecommerce/warehouse-robotics-and-automation.html

 

Databridge: https://www.databridgemarketresearch.com/reports/global-robotic-arm-market

 

CHILDREN’S CHARITY OAKLAND FOUNDATION WEBSITE RELAUNCHED

Posted on by hayley.smith@oakland-international.com

Children’s charity the Oakland Foundation has relaunched its website featuring a fresh design, improved functionality and easier access to essential information to help suitable applicants obtain support.

The Oakland Foundation charity, set up by total supply chain solutions provider and family business Oakland International, aims to ensure all children, and particularly those living in poverty or who are disadvantaged, can participate equally, irrespective of social background or physical ability, by offering support to children under the age of 16 and their families through programmes based around education, health and nutrition, and sport.

Oakland Foundation Trustee, Mark Williams, explains: “Our goal was to deliver our visitors with an easier way to learn about the types of support we offer and the youth targeted organisations we work with.

“Our fresh new design is now much easier to navigate, is providing an enhanced user experience and the feedback we’ve received has been extremely positive.”

Increasing their match-funding partnerships and opportunities with councils, the business community and youth groups the Foundation’s focus is to ensure availability of opportunity for all, particularly for those who would not routinely be able to take part in such programmes.

Last year alone the Oakland Foundation awarded grant funding which conservatively supported 3000+ children directly, with partnership development and collaborative funding opportunities a key focus.

Added Mark: “Working with the team from Gambit Nash, who we’ve known for several years, has made the whole process that much easier. We’re simply delighted with the result!”

To apply for Oakland Foundation funding or to donate or fundraise, please visit: www.oakland-foundation.com or call 01527 596222.

STAR REFRIGERATION’S DR. ANDY PEARSON RECEIVES SPECIAL PLAQUE FOR NEARLY TWO DECADES OF RESEARCH PAPER CONTRIBUTION AT THE 10TH IIR CONFERENCE ON AMMONIA AND CO2 REFRIGERATION TECHNOLOGIES

Posted on by Astrid Prado

The highly esteemed conference on ammonia and CO2 refrigeration brings together scientists and industry thought leaders from around the world to drive advancements and knowledge in natural refrigerants.

Dr. Andy Pearson, Group Managing Director of Star Refrigeration, was recently recognised for his 18 years of contribution to Ammonia and CO2 refrigeration research at the 10th International Conference on Ammonia and CO2 Refrigeration Technologies. Organised by the International Institute of Refrigeration (IIR) and the Faculty of Mechanical Engineering of the University of Ss Cyril & Methodius –Skopje, the conference was held in Ohrid, North Macedonia.

The biannual specialist conference unites the world’s preeminent scientists and industry leaders to promote knowledge exchange and foster innovation in ammonia and CO2 refrigeration technology. This year’s event took place from 27th – 29th April 2023, with the attendance of 500 international delegates.

Dr. Pearson was presented with the special plaque by Didier Coulomb, Director of IIR, and Risto Ciconkov, President of the Organising Committee. The accolade marks Dr. Pearson’s consistent presence and seminal research papers presented at all ten editions of the Ohrid conferences.

Since its inception in 2005, the conference’s objective has been to dispel ambiguities and confusion surrounding ammonia and CO2 refrigeration technologies. Aiming to bridge the gap between industry and academia, the conference was set up to respond to the global transition towards natural refrigeration technology following global efforts to phase-down HFCs to mitigate the catastrophic implications of climate change.

This year, Dr. Pearson, who is also the Conference’s President of the Scientific Committee, initiated the conference proceedings with his research paper, ‘Energy Performance of Process Cooling Equipment,’ in which he explored the challenges in the benchmarking energy performance of cooling processes due to the great variety in system types and products processed. Pearson also called for the development of data banks for different products and processes with the assistance and input from operators, saying that the key in benchmarking is to start data collecting as soon as possible in order to build up a pattern, even if the means of processing the data is not yet established.

The conference further addressed topics such as the design of modern ammonia (NH3) and CO2 refrigeration and heat pump systems, energy efficiency, and safety and compliance issues associated with natural refrigerants.

A prominent industry expert, Dr. Pearson is known for his profound knowledge of industrial refrigeration, having published numerous research studies on energy-efficient design, compliance, and safety of ammonia and CO2 refrigeration technology over four decades. His research and pioneering work in the design and installation of refrigeration and heat pump systems such as the world’s first and largest ammonia district heat pump in Drammen, Norway, have earned him prestigious recognitions, including the International Environmental Agency’s Rittinger Medal and the J&E Hall Gold Medal from the Institute of Refrigeration.

Dr Pearson is an IOR and ASHRAE Fellow and advises on the Refrigeration Safety Technical Committees for the British Standards Institute (BSI), the European Committee for Standardisation (CEN) and the International Standards Organisation (ISO).

On receiving the award, Dr. Pearson said, “I am honoured to receive this special plaque for for having presented at all ten Ohrid conferences. At Star Refrigeration, we remain committed to sharing innovative refrigeration knowledge and best practices underpinned by the most recent industry research.”

Star Refrigeration are a leading supplier of industrial ammonia and CO2 refrigeration and heat pump systems. With over 50 years of experience, the company is a total solutions provider, working in partnership with customers in the cold storage, pharmaceutical, food and drinks manufacturing, brewing, dairies data centres, building services, ice and leisure, petrochemical and district heating industries.

The IIR International Conference in Ohrid is a pivotal industry event for knowledge exchange on Ammonia and CO2 Refrigeration Technologies. For more information, visit https://iifiir.org/en/events/10th-iir-conference-on-ammonia-and-co2-refrigeration-technologies

To find out more about Star Refrigeration’s advancements in ammonia and CO2 refrigeration and heat pump technology, as well as their recent installations, visit https://www.star-ref.co.uk

STARFROST APPOINTS SCAN AMERICAN CORPORATION AS EXCLUSIVE NORTH AMERICAN AGENT

Posted on by Lauren Stephenson

Starfrost has recently announced that it has appointed Scan American Corporation as its exclusive agent in North America. Scan American Corporation will represent Starfrost’s range of mechanical freezing and chilling solutions throughout the USA and Canada.

This partnership is a significant step in Starfrost’s global expansion strategy, which focuses on delivering quality, high performance freezing and chilling systems that are tailored to the specific requirements of their clients. With Scan American’s expertise and reputation in the North American market, Starfrost is well positioned to expand its customer base and provide even more food manufacturers with access to its state-of-the-art cooling technology.

“We are delighted to be partnering with Scan American Corporation,” said Robert Long, Managing Director at Starfrost. “Their understanding of the North American food processing industry and their reputation for exceeding expectations make them an ideal partner for us.  We are confident that their sales expertise and dedication to service and aftercare will have great long term success. Our partnership with Scan American Corporation is just one more example Starfrost’s commitment to providing our customers with the best possible solutions to their freezing and chilling needs.”

Scan American Corporation, a well-established company with over 45 years of experience in the food processing equipment industry, has a reputation for representing some of the most respected suppliers in the market.

“We are excited to represent Starfrost in North America,” said, Ben Parker, Scan American’s Managing Director. “Their range of innovative freezing and chilling equipment is perfectly suited to the needs of the North American food processing industry. We look forward to working closely with Starfrost to bring these cutting-edge technologies to our customers and help them achieve their goals.”

For more information about Starfrost and its range of freezing and chilling solutions, please visit www.starfrost.com