Supplier Verification – On-site inspection

After a preliminary background check, an on-site inspection ought to proceed. The purpose of this verification is to make sure the supplier is capable to meet and continuously to maintain the standards demanded by the client.

Unlike the third-party certification audit, buyer’s assurance is less rigid, and usually without a protocol that needs to abide by. The bright side of this evaluation, in stead of a simple yes or no, the result of management and operations assessment may be indicated on a gradient map. Most importantly, an inspector is allowed to add his/her value judgement, intuition, reasonable doubts together with potential risk analysis and object evidence to draw a conclusion.

Moreover, a second-party audit is an opportunity for the buyer to enforce its particular demands in addition to fundamental food safety and quality requirements. Demands include but not limit to confidentiality in price and formula, product custom order, labeling & identification check, or special processing procedures. Audit may be planned more focusing on associated risks.

For example, a multiple-site aquaculture company, A+A Produce, intends to contracts a feed factory to manufacture a serial of special feeds exclusively for its own farms. Natural Astaxanthin, which is extracted from Hawaiian spirulina, will replace any other color additives in formulas. Dr. NO Technology Corp. is the only designated astaxanthin provider. Conditions and prices are confirmed in agreement.

Before agreement is signed, I would suggest to look into the following matters:

·???????? Source of ingredients. Select one or two staple ingredients (e.g. fish meal and fish oil) for on-site in stock cross check exercises, volume included. If such ingredient cannot entirely be tracked back to legal and trustworthy providers, then, untraceable goods might come from smuggled or parallel import, knockoff, over run, theft, and diversion sources. This is not only a food safety but also food fraud issue. Even through this is not direct evidence of counterfeit, however, it presents the opportunistic characters of the management.

·???????? Identification. Item name, code, lot, volume, certification status, and other information shall correctly be indicated physically or in an inventory system. Staff who work at warehouse must understand identification marks and capable to tell one thing from other similar goods. One more point, in case containers are reused, examine its relabelling procedure and a few samples. ?

·???????? Receiving and releasing. This is an inventory management performance trial. Review receiving records, is information sufficient to profile goods identification, storage location, quality and quantity check. Are new and old batches separatable? The highlight is whether data in paperwork matches reality. In releasing procedure, records need to show that each pickup is made for a work order of production. Moreover, the method and accuracy of measuring small amount ingredient (3 Kg of salt out of a 20Kg bag) is worth consideration as well. ?

·???????? Operation records. Obser how operation records are produced and find out the authenticity of data and documents. Are they real-time? Do workers at production line know how to use those documents? Are records filled by line workers or solely by QA staff? Is there a sop for error correction, changes or alternation?

For audits afterwards, the inspector might also like to verify that Astaxanthin from Dr. NO is exclusively apply to feed made for A+A. Choose a unit (lot, can bag or bucket) of astaxanthin for an input-output reconciliation test. Where the ingredient is released to and the balance give a perfect clue.