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Assignment of batch number for blended concentrated juices

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Yelizaveta

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Posted 08 October 2021 - 11:18 AM

Hello everyone!

Could you please advise on some recommendations/practices relating to assignment lot/batch and production date for concentrated juices?

Supposing that before shipment we blend juices of different production dates (for instance 3 or more) in order to get juice required quality. In the end in the accompanying documents we have to specify batch number and only one production date. But what if they are all from different months?

 

Thank you in advance!

 

 

 



olenazh

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Posted 08 October 2021 - 01:06 PM

Hi Yelizaveta. You could assign one batch number to the blended lot (not sure if you HAVE TO indicate a production date - but that might be required by the Ukrainian regulations) - however, you need to be able to trace back all those juices of different dates. 



Yelizaveta

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Posted 12 October 2021 - 07:33 AM

olenazh, Thank you for your answer.

Actually, that are requirements of our customers, which are situated mostly in Europe or Canada. BTW, how can we talk about shelf life if we do not indicate production date? Since shelf life should be indicated as well..



Scampi

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Posted 12 October 2021 - 02:17 PM

It sounds to me like your in house process needs tightened up.

 

Are the batches you blend all kept frozen?  How exactly have you determined your shelf, did you blend using longest possible frozen pre blend storage in your shelf life study?


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pHruit

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Posted 13 October 2021 - 03:31 PM

Not at all uncommon for juices to have a shelf life from date of blending/dispatch (particularly if you're shipping bulk / flexitanks).
Normally you'd assign a lot code to the finished blend, which you can link internally to your input batches.

As for shelf life, there are a few variables to consider.

I know of a good few juice processors who've validated life based on x months from leaving their controlled storage conditions - either cooled nitrogen-blanketed tanks, or frozen storage.

You could also consider setting a control on the age of the batches used in the blending, so e.g. if you give your finished blend 6 months life, but your input batches have say 24 months life in your storage, you'd ensure that you only ever use batches that are newer than 18 months old. This should be fairly workable, as unless you have some very odd crop/market conditions, you'd normally be using stock from the latest crop, perhaps blended with the residual stock from the old crop, particularly in the period when the new crop is starting and you might need to e.g. access some lower-acid concentrate from the latter part of the previous season, to blend with higher-acid concentrates from the start of new season.

 

Whatever you do, you should bear in mind that the EU customers may periodically want to see traceability examples for your blending process, and may ask lots of awkward questions if you're using stock that is >2 seasons old ;)



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Duncan

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Posted 14 October 2021 - 09:02 AM

If you take your separate concentrates (or any raw materials) and allocate them as input materials to a works order, that works order will produce 1 output batch - with a single batch number, BBE and production date.

 

It's conventional to apply a BBE as the production date plus a time delay, so production date plus one year, for example.

 

Sometimes you can hit a situation where the BBE applied to your output batch exceeds the BBE for one or more batches of raw material used. Where this is the case, you'd need to decide how to handle that based on risk assessment. Blending and/or processing of raw materials to produce a composite product may mean that the BBE of the input materials is not relevant to the finished product (e.g. if quality deterioration is not detectable in the finished product over the course of its assigned shelf life). Alternatively, the BBEs for input materials may present a limiting factor for the life of the composite product.

 

For example - one of your input juice concentrates may have a colour change or a change in acidity over the course of its shelf life, but no deterioration that would affect food safety. The shelf life that you could apply to your composite product would depend primarily on whether those changes were detectable in the blended product.

 

As an alternative example, if you were to blend several types of nut to make a snacking mix, rancidity would be likely to be detectable in the finished product mix - dictated by the shortest life of the input material batches - so in that situation it would be better to limit the shelf life of the composite product based on the remaining life on the raw materials.

 

Hope this helps.


Edited by Duncan, 14 October 2021 - 09:04 AM.

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