Up Front

When Tom Imholte released the first edition of his book Engineering for Food Safety and Sanitation nearly 30 years ago, I knew it would make a drastic impact on the way people understood how food plant design impacts sanitation. The book is full of pictures and diagrams on how to design and install equipment and build facilities with sanitation in mind. It remains an excellent guide to use when changes are made in our facilities.

I have recently seen an increase in the training offered to help the food industry meet the challenges ahead with increased emphasis on food safety. Several sponsored seminars about design, and construction to reduce possible pathogens and allergen issues have been well attended, especially by equipment engineers. However, while I have seen many improvements in our industry over the last 30 years, much more needs to be done.

We have new challenges in today's food industry. There is a growing need to control possible allergen issues through better cleaning and equipment breakdown. Then, there are the recurring microbiological issues in low-moisture facilities and the challenges of cleaning these dry processing environments. Add to this the likely loss or greatly restricted use of structural fumigants that have been heavily relied on in the past for pest control, and it's easy to see how ease of cleaning, whether due to time constraints or new food safety issues, is a reality.

Food safety continues to become more complex. The cost of meeting new sanitation challenges becomes more expensive when proper equipment design and installation is not incorporated into the facility. Installing equipment that is challenging to clean and break down is an avoidable expense. An improperly designed floor or roof will be very costly in the future. Something as simple as a missing or poorly designed drain will be increasingly more expensive to live with or relocate in the future.

It is very easy to blame engineers for poor facility design, especially if they don't understand issues of sanitation and food safety. But, while it is extremely important that engineers be trained in food safety, it is equally important that the food safety team work with them during the design and installation process. In addition to working with them, upper management needs to be responsible for weighing the economics of the design decisions to determine what future costs may be incurred. Mistakes in design and installation are very expensive.

The author is Vice President of Food Safety Education, AIB International.