Cold Link Africa January / February 2020 | Page 42

CONTRIBUTORS
Houston,
we have a problem…
By Jan Lievens, senior consultant on applied postharvest technologies, UTE South Africa
Jan Lievens, born in Belgium, is
a graduate civil engineering(B)
and international senior
consultant for engineered
applied postharvest technology
at UTE South Africa. With over
20 years of experience in this
field, he is widely regarded
as a specialist in the fruit-,
vegetable- and flower industry
with regards to humidity,
airborne bacteria and ethylene
removal, both locally and
internationally. Furthermore, he
also designed airflow-friendly
packaging systems for the
industry with proven results.
When Professor Dr Luis Luchsinger was in South Africa in 2015 to present a table grape seminar in
Paarl, he described the situation as he had seen it as shown by the organisers of the seminar.
He painted a grim picture which a lot of the seminar attendees didn’t like.
S
imply put, he pointed out the
problems the industry had in 2015.
He also handed out a very
practical, detailed manual where
whatever he reported on at the time, is
now concentrated in a nice synopsis
with solutions.
COOLING FRUIT DIFFERS FROM
MAKING FRUIT COLD
Of course, since there are always
exceptions to the rule, some people
really do it differently and try to get it
right first time, every time. Truly, there are
people that get it right, even big cold
store operations, like Kriegler Farms in the
Western Cape.
In 2017 I received ‘TempTale’
temperature information on various Table
Grape container shipments from their
last season from a traditional table grape
growing area in South Africa and they
made me realise that we indeed have a
problem. Prof Luchsinger was right. Not
only that, we are four years down the line
and there are still problems, and not small
ones, big ones.
I was shocked when I received,
read and analysed them, but I’m even
more shocked that nothing gets done
about it. You all know the old saying:
‘Measuring is knowing’. These containers
must have been loaded according to
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www.coldlinkafrica.co.za
our Perishable Products Export Control
Board (PPECB) protocol. Surely, they had
to be, otherwise it defeats the object of
checking and exercising ‘export control’
not so?
In all the various protocols, the
temperatures are clearly described. Now,
the question is where do you measure
what?
You must measure ‘core temperature’
of the fruit. Simple. It doesn’t help to ‘just
measure’ the outside box on the cold side
of the forced air tunnel. Sure, that is the
quickest box to be cold. Please, who’s
trying to fool who? If that’s the way things
are done, you obviously ‘trick’ the cooling
down temperatures as well.
It doesn’t help to ‘think’ your tunnels
are fast if you don’t measure the right
temperature. As a cold store operator, you
are perhaps and probably boosting your
figures, and your personal achievements,
but you are tricking your clients: the
farmers.
It also makes this whole debate on fast
cooling times in forced air tunnels very
lively. It’s like throwing everything you
have into a Formula 1 car on qualifying
timing laps then, when it comes to the
race, you stand in the paddock with
your car on jacks, without petrol, without
your team and without driver. It’s like
asking Usain Bolt to run his fastest ever
100 meters, in full special forces battle
dress with extra cobble stones in the
pack. I would like to stress the basics: a
cold chain is a temperature-controlled
supply chain.
An unbroken cold chain is an
uninterrupted series of storage and
distribution activities which maintain a
given temperature range. It is used to
help extend and ensure the shelf life of
products such as fruits, vegetables, and
flowers and not just Table Grapes.
Please don’t be distracted by the ‘Cost
of Cold Chain Compliance’, rather look at
the cost of ‘Non-Compliance’.
What is your total cost? There you must
bring various factors in:
• What is the ‘Total Cost of Current
System’?
• What do you write off?
• What are your quality claims?
• How big is your customer
dissatisfaction?
Apart from the labour involved in
investigations, two huge problems surface:
1. You pay the bills
2. You stand to lose your reputation
And if you lose your reputation, you lose
sales.
So now you know, what do you do?
Be responsible, acknowledge the problem
and fix it: It doesn’t help to put out
‘another’ study by our various researchers,
scientists and various other institutions. That
has been done numerous times over the
year. In fact, from before I was born and
that’s well before the start of some well-
known wars.
Be realistic and practical: Monitor your
whole process until your cold chain
is validated. Practical Cold Chain
Performance Qualification should be done
periodically. This process picks up small
things that creep undetected into the
daily routines of cold chain management
in the process.
And remember, as potential clients, you
seek consultants for their knowledge and
experience. You expect a consultant to
know more than those on your staff. This
experience cannot be acquired overnight.
This is especially valid for practical post-
harvest experience.
Furthermore, I have news for you – sorry,
it’s never over. Houston, we didn’t just
‘have’ a problem, we still have a problem,
in addition it’s obvious that doing nothing
is not an option.
This is written without a commercial
intention, simply because we must fix what
is wrong.
If you can share worldwide, it hopefully
draws the attention to a real problem
that I’m sure is not confined to South
Africa only. CLA
COLD LINK AFRICA •
January/February 2020