Can barcodes and production date & time be used as a batch?

Dear Members,

I have a question regarding serial/batch/lot numbers of products. I am working in governmental organization. Very often we meet with problem "how to identify imported products serial/batch/lot numbers". Sometimes inspectors just can not find it. My question barcodes and production date&time can be used as a serial/batch/lot numbers to identify and track food product and help in case of withdrawal and recall? Because as I know some barcodes (or all of them) contain information about serial/batch/lot numbers even item.

Thanks in advance

Best regards,

Saida S

Hi Saida,
I think the answer to that is "maybe".

Some barcodes will be unique and facilitate proper traceability, but not all - this is going to depend to an extent on the format and content of the specific barcodes used. It's also quite a lot of detail to expect someone to write down accurately and I've always found shipping to go smoothest when things are as easy as possible for customs points!

Production date/time may uniquely identify the batch so that could work, but again in the interests of making it relatively simple for traceability at customer, import/export control etc , there is perhaps some merit to having a clear "batch code" or "lot code" marked on the label. This means everyone can readily identify it without needing to know that the production date doubles as the batch code.

Dear Sida,

see your food law requirements on labelling which all imported products have to fullfil. In the EC it is madatory that consumers can clearly read the data.

Rgds 

moskito