Designing a Consumer Assurance Programme
In order to define a framework of relevant regulations and standards, it’s important to answer questions such as: is your product retailed locally, or is it an export product? Does the company need or want to achieve sustainability goals? Which claims do you make (or want to make) on your product label? Are there mandatory product quality standards with which you need to comply? Do you wish to establish your own quality standards, which food safety system do you need or want to comply with, does your food safety programme include vulnerability (VACCP) and threat (TACCP) studies? Again, the list goes on.
Aspects to be included in your Consumer Assurance Programme:
- Consolidate regulations and standards relevant to the assessed food product or category, cross-referencing all applicable regulations under the various regulatory authorities.
- Incorporate relevant risks associated with product, production process and manufacturing environment.
- Identify possible unforeseen risks in the full chain of custody, and consider product- or origin-specific risks not yet regulated in South Africa or elsewhere in the world.
- Ensure that all suppliers provide a comprehensive and truthful product information form (PIF/supplier questionnaire).
South African regulations place a high level of responsibility on manufacturers and retailers of foodstuffs, with the Consumer Protection Act (CPA) adding extra pressure. In addition to the regula- tory responsibility, there is ever-increasing public interest among consumers with regard to the products they select and the information recorded on product labelling. All this, plus the effects of globalisation on the food trade, means that commodities move through the hands of various agents before they reach their final destination. The question is: can the food-manufacturing industry afford not to assess critically – and, ultimately, know – its products?
Food manufacturers are juggling numerous balls, from safety, quality and sustainability (business and planet is- sues) to special qualities of the product communicated on the product label and consumer needs … the list goes on. A common headache seems to be the lack of an efficient programme for managing and acknowledging these demands in one system that would enable manufactur- ers really to know their products. “Consumer Assurance Programme” (CAP) is a term much used in the automo- tive industry, but is a novel concept in the food industry, though it’s becoming crucial. CAP applied in the food industry could be the “one-stop checklist” bringing all the different aspects of brand management together. But it’s hard to define CAP, as one size does not fit all; each com- pany has its own challenges. Identifying regulations and standards relevant to your products and sector is a good place to start, to pin down the “juggling balls” and create a framework that will serve as a base for benchmarking your company’s Consumer Assurance Programme.
- Set up a testing schedule based on the regulations and standards identified.
- Arrange to have your products analysed by a laboratory that can offer a meaningful analysis of results and, where necessary, is able to interpret these results.
- Consolidate testing results with an IT solution that will allow results to be accessed easily in the case of a customer query, and will enable the data to be used to create a trend.
Ensure you include a traceability system in your company. The CAP is often driven by consumers and media. An example of this is the company Pepsi, who were forced to remove aspartame from their products due to con- sumer demand. Your company’s CAP should continuously evolve and improve as the business, industry, standards and regulations change. Rome was not built in a day; equally, a CAP may begin by tackling only a single aspect, building robust procedures to support that aspect, and then moving on to the next aspect – gradually building a comprehensive programme, as your knowledge base and resources grow.