Eagle offers a safe harbor for product inspection hygiene and safety
Eagle Product Inspection (Eagle, eaglepi.com), a leading provider of physical contamination detection and quality assurance equipment, will showcase a number of advanced technology and software solutions, in addition to offering a cruise giveaway, at Pack Expo 2016.
Product inspection plays on every manufacturers mind in the food sector. With the regulatory landscape evolving rapidly, with regulations such as FSMA and HACCP for example, X-ray technology is now a commonplace tactic for the detection of physical contaminants in a wide variety of sectors – from bakery and snacks to dairy, meat and poultry, ready meals and confectionery. Inline fat analysis (FA) too is becoming more widely adopted in the meat and poultry sector, as accurate measurements of mass and Chemical Lean (CL) values can enable processors to increase yield and extract maximum value from their product. Eagle’s new OPTUM recipe management software will be on display at the Expo, which complements FA systems in this area.
In addition to the core competencies of the systems Eagle has to offer in terms of physical contaminant detection, the company has also taken care to help mitigate another form of contamination – namely pathological – which has potential to cause damage to brand reputation. There have been a number of reports in the international press regarding outbreaks of diseases such as Listeria, E.Coli and Salmonella, therefore sanitary design and ability to clean equipment effectively is of paramount importance. While x-ray systems are not able to physically detect microbial contamination, the design of the systems is a critical factor to reducing the risks associated with bacterial ingress, survival, growth and reproduction.
Kyle Thomas, strategic business unit manager at Eagle Product Inspection, comments: “With product recalls persisting as an issue for manufacturers and food safety laws becoming increasingly strict, it is vital that product inspection systems not only perform well but are designed both to prevent bacterial growth and to facilitate the level of cleaning necessary in the food processing environment. Many of Eagle’s X-ray inspection systems have been designed using the NAMI (North American Meat Institute) Sanitary Equipment Design Principles and are also available with IP69 ingress protection, which enables them to withstand thorough and rigorous sanitation routines, including high pressure wash down procedures.”
The NAMI Design Principles take into consideration areas such as accessibility of equipment parts for sanitation purposes, prevention of product and liquids collecting on the system, and ensuring equipment parts are free of niches such as pits, cracks or open seams where bacteria are prone to collect.
At Pack Expo, Eagle will showcase three x-ray inspection products: