Last September marks the beginning of a very busy time for a high number of quality and supply chain managers in the food industry. This is when the iComplai machine learning algorithms detected the first anomalies in sesame seeds with ethylene oxide.

Below you can see the recalls of sesame seeds over the last years.

After the detection of ethylene oxide in sesame seeds from India at the border, companies as well as the market surveillance authorities started testing for the products that are already in the market, which lead to many positive test results and thus a wave of recalls.

Among the reasons of the high recalls are the complexities of supply chain and traceability as well as sesame seeds being used as raw materials in many end products varying from hummus to hamburger bread.

How can the food safety manufacturers avoid such a large recall in the future?

1. Detect Anomalies

   Risks & notifications in the market happen very frequently. But which of these should you pay special attention to? With an anomaly detection system you can differentiate the “usual” warnings, risks vs. the ones that are out of the ordinary and decide how to act. An anomaly detection system, like the one of iComplai, will alert you for any abnormalities in the market. This early warning allows you to react on time and avoid costly recalls.

2. Extend your risk horizon

   Last year September was not the first time ethylene oxide was found in fresh produce from India. The same substance was detected in 2018 in black pepper and in 2019 in cumin seeds from India. Depending on country risk (low-medium-high) you can choose to extend your product risk horizon and monitoring from a single product to cover the complete fresh produce or even the complete food chain. Periodically analysing the emerging risks from your sourcing country will give you the opportunity to detect emerging risks on time and take the necessary precautions.

   An AI-powered food intelligence system like iComplai will calculate the country risk for you as well as list the substances / warnings for the horizon of products you choose within seconds.

3. Take action

   Once you make an early & concrete assessment of your risks, you can adapt your supplier audits, restructure raw material risk assessments and adapt your complete risk assessment process accordingly.

   Food safety risk and risk assessment is like a living organism that is easily impacted by various conditions thus changing frequently. A robust early warning system coupled with anomaly detection will help you stay up-to-date with the current and emerging risks, avoid recalls and save lives.