admin

RECENT TRENDS AFFECTING THE COLD CHAIN INDUSTRY

Uncategorized /

Republication from www.foodlogistics.com online publication Contributor: https://seacubecontainers.com In this article we look at the major trends that is influencing the Cold Chain Industry at the current stage. The views in the article have been contributed by American company, SeaCube Container Leasing (SCCL) Ltd, in Foodlogistics.coms’ publication. SCCL have enabled the growth in global trade because they allow efficient movement of goods via ships, rail, and trucks. SeaCube is a leader in refrigerated shipping containers, including the generator sets used to power the refrigerated containers while carrying cold goods to their final destination or while used for cold storage applications. The article below is their view of how the cold chain transport sector has been influenced due to the COVID pandemic. How COVID-19 Made Cold Chain Trends More Transformative Than Ever Recent trends, emerging innovation and nascent cold chain technology will continue to shape the ever-changing requirement for the refrigerated and cold chain markets International shipping delays create an increase in cold chain warehousing capacity International movement of refrigerated products continues to be delayed as a result of the pandemic. With the advent of new foreign food inspection regulations, port congestion, reefer container shortages, and port congestion being the nemesis of expedited food delivery, cold chain storage has been a hot growth area. Investment in cold chain storage and refrigerated food conveyance is on the top of the charts for investors with double-digit growth projections for the next few years. Other hot trends for cold chain management and transportation Several catalysts are expected to fuelling the growth in the cold chain sector. The pandemic has created many food category demand shifts, with the most prominent being a shift from high-end gourmet specialty food products associated with travel, restaurants, and entertainment business to retail packaged frozen and perishable products. There are also several other key areas that are driving exponential growth and trend shifts in the cold chain markets. Some of these key cold chain trends include the following: Consumers have an insatiable appetite for fresh foods Health trends are pushing more and more consumers toward healthier diets, resulting in an increased demand for specialty foods. Some of this has been accelerated by people wanting healthier choices when spending more time at home. Most data are now pointing to consumers demanding fresh diet choices moving forward, which will be dependent on cold chain capacity. With this demand acceleration for fresh and organic diets, grocers must ensure perishable foods are ripe, appealing and that the selection is abundant to stay competitive. Image source: gard.no – Managing COVID-19 cases on board Technology plays a more significant role in the cold chain  With COVID-19 and the global regulatory framework constantly changing, technology will expand its critical role invisibility, monitoring, and compliance going forward. The need for tracing food sources and monitoring environmental conditions of food cargo events will be elevated since inspection processes will be streamlined as compliance rigor increases. In addition, as transit times increase due to the supply chain challenges connected to COVID-19, controlled-atmosphere refrigerated technology will become more necessary. Access to additional labour, transportation capacity planning and redundancy will be a priority for the cold chain to be reliable.  Until the vaccine is widely distributed and available, the cold chain transportation networks will continue to be disrupted. Labour shortages, quarantine impacts, and delivery conveyance will continue to be challenged with inconsistent performance and reliability as a result of the virus. These pandemic-related impacts will create the need for companies to re-visit their planning strategy, incorporating redundancy and contingency options. This will also create demand for incremental outsourcing with services being necessary to accommodate for virus prevention cold chain-related activities. With the COVID-19 pandemic outbreak occurring just a year ago, we need to take away as much as we can from the last 12 months as we plan for the future, learning from our missteps and building on our successes. Efficient and effective cold chain management will be an ongoing challenge for all cold chain stakeholders who bear the responsibility for ensuring uninterrupted delivery of temperature-controlled products to key markets throughout the world. Fortunately, it has already been proven that the cold chain industry can quickly adapt and innovate to serve the increasingly more complex supply chain. Recent trends, emerging innovation, and nascent cold chain technology will continue to shape the ever-changing requirement for the refrigerated and cold chain markets.

RECENT TRENDS AFFECTING THE COLD CHAIN INDUSTRY Read More »

BARPRO STORAGE RACK SAFETY AWARENESS TRAINING

Uncategorized /

In our previous edition we brought attention to Rack safety awareness and the need for training and the tools that can be used in the process that serves as an indicator of rack damage to uprights, bracings & beam deflections. During this time, we have been approached by companies to provide training to their warehouse employees. Barpro’s Johannesburg branch conducted training sessions for companies such as Sparta Beef and Imperial Logistics. The training was well received by the training facilitators, Health and Safety officers and trainees. At the end of the one-day course, the employees were able to identify: The effects of pallet racking accidents on a business and its people. The need for rack inspections. Types and frequency of inspections, responsibilities of suppliers & users. Racking / Components and the role they play. How to use the Barpro Rack Inspection Tool to complete inspections. Completing the paperwork, record keeping and collating. THE TRAINING The training followed a structured approach which consists of: Part 1: Theoretical – Reporting, Record keeping and responsibilities Part 2: Practical training in the warehouse space with the use of the Rack Inspection Safety tool WHAT DO YOU RECEIVE IN THE TRAINING PACK? Contents of the training file: Damage Categories Weekly Inspection Sheets Red Risk Items Spare Weekly Inspection Sheets Presentation Rack Inspection Tool User Guide Rack Load Signs Racking Components  SEMA Code of practice guidelines for Static Racking THE TRAINING SESSIONS AT SPARTA BEEF & IMPERIAL (Jetpak & Modderfontein) We conducted an interview with the Sales and Marketing Manager, Robert Kershaw from our Johannesburg branch regarding the clients’ feedback and process. The trainers for the two sites were the Senior Technician, Gaven Swanepoel and Robert Kershaw. Review: How did the client get to know about the training session? Barpro was in the process of performing routine maintenance on the mobile racking installation. During the service the concept of the rack safety testing tool was pitched to the Supervisor. What factors contributed to the success of the training? The session was a two-way compact workshop presentation covering all the major factors regarding rack safety The trainees were enthusiastic and their willingness to learn was positive as the case studies we presented were relatable. The Health and Safety officers were keen to implement the system. Who attended the training? Stock takers Supervisors Pickers Warehouse operators The companies were able to appoint a PRRS (Person Responsible for Rack Safety). The official’s duties are as follows: For more detailed information on the course please contact: James Cunningham (Cape Town) – james@barpro.co.za Maxine Pereira (Johannesburg) – jhbadmin@barpro.co.za

BARPRO STORAGE RACK SAFETY AWARENESS TRAINING Read More »

THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE COLD STORAGE INDUSTRY

Uncategorized /

Frederic Tudor’s role in the development of Cold Storage should not be underestimated. He was the 19th century Bostonian who built an international market for ice, winter harvested from the ponds of Massachusetts. With markets as far away as Calcutta and the Caribbean. Not only did he have to develop insulated panels filled with sawdust to minimize melt, but sell ice into markets that had never seen it before.  Today, fridges and freezers are just part of daily life. But keeping them full requires a sophisticated supply chain including commercial freezer stores, a concept that started with Fred Tudor’s novel business strategy. His first cold store was in Havana. Of more interest to today’s cold store managers is just how much freezer stores have changed in the past 50 years. In the late 1980’s South Africa, there were freezer stores insulated with cork. Refrigeration was provided via ammonia-filled pipes attached to freezer store walls. Pallets and pallet racking in freezer stores were still a rarity. Stocktaking in block stacked steel “convertors” was a nightmare and computerized warehouse management systems didn’t exist. But even if it wasn’t understood at the time, freezer stores were changing fast through a number of mutually reinforcing developments that occurred at much the same time. Although counterbalanced forklifts had been around since the 1920’s it wasn’t until 1954 that British company Lancing Bagnall developed the reach truck to operate in narrower access aisles lifting palletized product to heights approaching 12 meters. This allowed freezer stores to become one high ceilinged chamber rather than several floors with lower chambers. Heated cabs arrived in the 1990’s to significantly improve driver comfort. In Brisbane Australia, Michael Rudnev developed the insulated sandwich panel consisting of chromadek sheeting glued on either side of a polystyrene core. Not only was the insulation value of polystyrene better than cork, but Rudnev’s panels, although light, had sufficient strength to support lengths exceeding 10 meters. In Cape Town’s Paarden Eiland, one can still see this transition playing out. At Table Bay Cold Storage, although polystyrene panel was used, the main store has 2 levels with a large lift going to the top floor. On the other side of the street is I&J’s Auckland Cold Store, built slightly later, where one chamber is over 10 meters high. Both stores were built by the Michaelson’s Group in the 1970’s. PALLETIZATION Palletization was another important development. Wooden pallets developed from wooden skids. The difference being that a skid doesn’t have bottom stringers or boards. Pallets can be placed on top of another palletized load as the bottom stringers distribute the weight more evenly. Pallets became increasingly popular in the 1930’s when used with forklifts but really took off in WW2 when the US shipped military equipment to Australia on pallets. The war end pallet surplus was inherited by CHEP or Commonwealth Handling Equipment Pool, which in turn sold it to Brambles Industries. CONTAINERS It was another war, this time the Vietnamese one ending in 1975, which launched shipping containers as the unit load for global supply chains. In freezer stores cartons of frozen product change shape as their core temperature drops to minus 18 degrees C, making the stacking of palletized product unsafe. The initial solution to this challenge was the steel convertor, a steel frame about 1650 mms high that could have a wooden pallet permanently strapped into its base. Convertors could be block stacked up to 5 in the height. Pallet racking was first introduced into case picking freezer stores as every stock keeping unit (SKU) needed to be immediately accessible. Pallet racking in bulk freezer stores took off with the arrival of mobile racking in the late 1980’s which combines maximum storage density with the same accessibility as normal static racking. PALLET RACKING Pallet racking is the grandchild of the corrugated iron, invented by Henry Palmer in the 1830’s as, “The lightest and strongest roof for its weight since the time of Adam,” but it was only in the 1950’s that Dexion received a patent for its roll-formed pallet racking. Dexion slotted shelving, the name means “right” in Greek, was invented by Australian-born print industry supplier Demetrius Comino to solve challenges around the storage of paper on wooden shelves. It wasn’t long before Dexion racking was used for storing pallets at ever-increasing heights in freezer stores. BARCODE LABEL Another development necessary for modern freezer stores was the barcode label, which is the fail-safe way of tracking products and their position within chambers. As the other technologies already mentioned allowed freezer stores to increase in size, some now contain more than 30,000 pallets, accurate recording became crucial. This shouldn’t surprise as warehousing has always required reliable recording systems. Writing itself was developed to record who had supplied what in the warehouses of ancient Sumer. The first barcode to be scanned commercially in a US supermarket is said to have been a packet of Wrigley ‘s Juicy Fruit chewing gum in 1974. Freezer stores experienced some teething problems with bar code scanning through the windows of heated cabs, handheld scanners that couldn’t function at minus 25˚C, and scanner beams being deflected by ice crystals on bar code labels. Once these were solved, and working in conjunction with computers, the bar code became a major driver behind warehouse management systems, without which modern cold stores simply couldn’t function.   

THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE COLD STORAGE INDUSTRY Read More »