Food Safety Sampling Plans With Audit-Based Traceability
Find Innovative SolutionsGenerate Solutions
Solution Overview
Problem
The challenge of providing improved traceability and optimized sampling routines for pathogenic microorganism testing in agriculture is exacerbated by the difficulty in linking lab test results to specific crop lots and the increasing cost of population sampling, which often yields marginal improvements.
Innovation Solution
A system and method utilizing a sampling plan generator on mobile devices to create optimized sampling plans, integrating geolocation data and food safety audit information, ensuring precise sample collection and traceability through barcode tagging and cloud-based data management.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Reliability
If the number of samples obtained per lot increases, then the probability of detecting a present pathogen improves, but the cost becomes prohibitive
Solution Approach 1:
The system performs preliminary actions by collecting and analyzing food safety audit information about the agriculture area before conducting pathogen testing. This preliminary data collection includes information about farming practices, historical contamination data, and risk factors, which allows the system to optimize the sampling plan and reduce the number of samples needed while maintaining detection probability.
Solution Approach 2:
The system changes parameters by using food safety audit information to dynamically adjust sampling parameters such as sample size, sampling locations, and sampling frequency. Instead of using fixed sampling protocols, the system modifies these parameters based on the specific risk profile of each agriculture area, thereby reducing unnecessary sampling while maintaining detection effectiveness.
2Productivity
If operations grow larger, then production capacity increases, but the ability to provide traceability of test results to particular samples becomes increasingly difficult and time-consuming
Solution Approach 1:
The system implements a universal traceability mechanism that handles multiple functions simultaneously: tracking samples from collection through testing to results, managing food safety audit information, and maintaining linkage between test results and specific agriculture areas. This multi-functional approach allows large-scale operations to maintain traceability without proportionally increasing time investment.
Solution Approach 2:
The system introduces an intermediary layer of food safety audit information that serves as a mediator between the physical sampling process and the laboratory testing process. This intermediary data structure maintains the linkage between test results and specific samples/locations, enabling automated traceability even as operation scale increases.
Data Source
AI summary
Disclosed herein are embodiments of a system, method, and non-transitory computer-readable storage media for generating sampling plans for a selected agriculture area and providing a user interface configured to display sampling plan information to a user to allow for validation and traceability of sample collection in the agriculture area. One or more embodiments allow for sample plan information to be based in part on food safety audit information, some or all of which may have been collected using the system.