It might be the time of year when ghosts and ghouls traditionally come out to play, but the rest of the year has its fair share of nasties when it comes to hygiene-conscious industries.
We live in the age of unannounced audits, where ensuring you are always audit-ready is a daily way of working and part of the overall hygiene culture of your business. While you may think you have all the right hygienic furniture and equipment in place to avoid attack from the bacterial monsters that lurk in the dark corners, the biggest risk to food safety is, DUN-DUN-DUUUUN, humans.
Yes, humans. We poor hapless souls who do the best we can but so often get things so, so wrong.
Human error can rear its ugly head through such nefarious means as a lack of training, a poor hygiene culture or even poorly designed or old hygienic furniture that can damage PPE, exposing the foreign body risk of humans.
Wet and rusty environments are a breeding ground for the type of horrific and deadly critters that are the terror of hygienic environments. The moisture and rust provide a perfect habitat for bacteria to grow and multiply. Some of the odious beasts that can be found in such a place include:
- Salmonella
- E.coli
- Listeria
- Staphylococcus aureus
- Pseudomonas aeruginosa
- Campylobacter
- Shigella
- Vibrio cholerae
- Yersinia enterocolitica
These bacteria can lead to a variety of truly horrifying symptoms, such as – Diarrhoea, vomiting, fever, abdominal cramps, headache and fatigue. In some cases, these bacteria can cause illness that can be serious or even fatal.
The challenges of staying audit-ready for any operations manager are huge. They need to deal with the potential for equipment and human error every day and need the peace of mind that their processes won’t be let down by poorly designed equipment, which must be audit-ready at all times.
Badly designed equipment can not only lead to a poor audit but can also mean being placed on technical review. Technical review can be a serious matter for food manufacturers. It can lead to lost sales, damaged reputations and even regulatory sanctions.
However, by taking steps to address this issue quickly and effectively, manufacturers can minimise the effects of technical review and get back to business as usual. Having the right training and the right grade of material and equipment to be fit for purpose can avoid poor audits and technical review. Good design and understanding of the production processes and hygiene regimes can make all the difference when it comes to hygienic furniture.
To help keep the wolf from the door, Teknomek have poured all of our 36 years of experience into making sure these issues don’t happen to your business. We are here to help you fight the nasties that lurk in the dark – fighting them with intelligent, hygienic design, a true understanding of the requirements of hygienic manufacturing processes and easy to clean, sturdy and corrosion-resistant hygienic furniture.
With Teknomek by your side, you can feel confident of letting the auditor on the factory floor and letting them marvel at the bacteria-free and hygienic equipment you have at your disposal.
