Food & Drug Packaging Safety
Machine Vision Consulting (MVC) has expertise and products for the inspection of food and drug labels and packages. We work with our customers to insure the safety of their food and pharmaceutical packaging. Our machine vision products prevent recalls due to mislabeling or mispackaging.
SureLabel™ Featured in Vision Systems Design Magazine Article
Vision Systems Design News: October 2010 Issue, "Sweet Success", SureLabel verifies ice cream container packaging.
Machine Vision for Food & Drug Packaging Safety
Background
"An estimated 150 to 200 Americans die each year because of allergic reactions to food, according to the FDA’s food-testing laboratories. Almost 30,000 people go to the emergency room each year with severe food allergic reactions."1 (October 27, 2010, by Yewon Kang of Medill News Service, Market Watch).
"The Food and Drug Administration reported more than 1,742 (drug) recalls in 2009, skyrocketing from 426 in 2008, according to the Gold Sheet, a trade publication on drug quality that analyzes FDA data."2 (August 16, 2010, by Parija Kavilanz).
FDA Food Safety Modernization Act
On January 4, President Obama signed into law the FDA Food Safety Modernization Act. Although there are several provisions within this act, the key emphasis is on "prevention".
- The US Government now has the power to3:
- Initiate a recall, up until now, the consumer had to rely on the manufacturer or distributor to voluntarily initiate a recall.
- Conduct facility inspections more frequently and to change the focus based on “risk” (i.e., the facilities and products that pose a greater risk will receive more attention).
And the law also requires all food facilities to have in place a “written food safety plan” that identifies the possible problems and the plan to prevent those problems from occurring.
Machine Vision in Food and Drug Safety
Machine vision is ideal for “prevention”. Machine Vision provides the ability, through the use of cameras, to automatically “see” the product and “verify the correctness” of the product packaging. Those products that are "not correct" are removed from the manufacturing line, thus preventing receipt of the product by the consumer.
Machine vision systems can operate at high speeds and without human intervention. They are adept at identifying human and machine errors. Machine vision systems can provide logs of all events and store images of the failed product. Compared to the cost of a recall or the damage to the brand image, machine vision systems are cost effective. In many cases, a turnkey system can be installed on an existing manufacturing line with little or no modifications to the line.
Machine Vision Consulting Products
Machine Vision Consulting, Inc., has been working in the pharmaceutical and food packing industry for many years. We see first hand how recall issues arise.
- Common issues on a manufacturing line include:
- Misprinting of codes (i.e., product, date, lot) – due to printer or product orientation error
- Mislabeling of a product (wrong label, label unreadable, label positioned incorrectly, etc.) – due to human error, label application system or product handling
- Mismatching of a lid to a container
- Lid not sealed – product contamination
- Foreign matter in product
In response, we have developed a suite of inspection products designed to validate the product and prevent receipt of an invalid product by the consumer.
Our CodeSure® product, is a fully integrated hardware-software solution suite that provides code and label verification on moving or rolling cans. Machine Vision Consulting's unique system design supports machine code verification on can lids using optical character verification (OCV) as well as inspects label correctness by verifying the barcode or 2D Data Matrix.
Our SureLabel™ product, is a powerful and flexible label inspection system that verifies pre-printed labels on oriented flat, sqround or oval shaped commercial containers.
Our CircumSpect® product, provides 360 degree package and label inspection without requiring contact or a particular product orientation. Our 100% inspection can verify up to 750 units per minute on round or cylindrical products.
In addition to installing our products on baby food lines, ice cream packaging lines, food processing lines (i.e., salad dressing, apple sauce) and pill manufacturing lines, Machine Vision Consulting has also developed numerous custom inspection solutions to address specific and unique product or packaging issues.
To learn more about how Machine Vision Consulting can work with you to enable your food safety prevention plan, complete our contact us form or contact us directly at 978.551.4160.
