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Product inspection of pet foods helps ensure consistent production of high quality, contaminant-free meals and treats for dogs, cats, and other household pets. Food safety and brand protection are as important for these food products as they are for every other member of the family.
There is a proliferation of pet food products on the market, from kibble and canned foods to freshly prepared meals, treats, and supplements that contribute to pets’ immune, digestive, and joint heath. Pet food manufacturers of all sizes need industrial checkweighers and foreign object detection technologies to help ensure brand protection and peace of mind.
Producers must use the right food safety inspection equipment for each type of pet food — dry, moist, liquid, etc., as well as the packaging type. Packaging innovations incorporate the same excitement as other consumer products: more sustainable, attention catching on the store shelf, or shipping capability through e-commerce channels. Additionally, producing pet food products at sufficient volume to meet consumer demand means ensuring high manufacturing throughput. Such inspection integrity requires a deep understanding of both inspection technologies and the regulations guiding inspection standards for pet consumption.
The same regulatory framework governing human food production applies to pet food and treats. However, governmental regulations, like those of the US Food & Drug Administration (FDA), generally are broad and cover a wide spectrum of risks and processing requirements. Retailers may set even higher standards through codes of practice required to do business with them, establishing a wider food safety framework through increased prescriptiveness. Retailer codes of practice typically are guided by the Global Food Safety Initiative (GFSI).
Product inspection considerations for pet food processing
A typical process for pet food manufacturing involves incoming ingredient processing, blending, cooking, molding, packaging, storage, and then transportation. Where in-process inspection should occur depends on where foreign matter, including debris resultant of worn processing equipment, could enter the process. These areas of greatest risk are the critical control points. At each critical control point, producers must think about the product and package being inspected in order to select the right technology solution.
Processing environment considerations include equipment cleaning regimens, which can vary between light (end-of process dry and wet food packaging) and heavy (cooking and mixing ingredients, where food buildup is difficult to avoid). In addition to preventing microbial contamination, manufacturers must select instrumentation with an adequate ingress protection rating, able to withstand moisture and dust from the surrounding environment across a long service life.
Other plant environment concerns can include vibrations or sources of electromagnetic interference (EMI) that could impact inspection systems. In short, detection technology is a starting point, but a more holistic approach to the system is required for smooth integration into your specific factory environment that provides reliable, long-term operation.
Segments
Industrial food metal detectors, which can identify ferrous, non-ferrous, and stainless-steel foreign objects are suitable for a variety of pet foods, such as frozen raw meal or kibble. The metal detector measures magnetic and conductive properties of the packaged product. Any inspected product will have intrinsic magnetic and conductive signals, considered as product effect.
Product effect varies between product and package types—for instance, dry product like kibble will have very low product effect, whereas wet cat food will show significantly more product effect due to its high moisture and salt content. A successful metal detector measurement will minimize product effect and maximize contaminant detection.
To minimize contamination risk and meet Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Point (HACCP) objectives in food safety compliance, metal detection may be used at multiple locations in the process from incoming raw material to molding to final packaging.
Food X-ray inspection equipment provides an image of each package’s contents, allowing inspectors to identify packages with metallic and non-metallic contaminants, such as glass and rubber, as well as broken food pieces and missing components. X-ray inspection is not influenced by product effect or package effect, so it can be used for a wider range of products and packaging materials, especially those made from metalized film and aluminum foil trays.
X-ray inspection can be employed as early as the incoming ingredients stage in place of metal detection, and as late as case packing. Since many pet foods provide a full-diet solution, they may contain a bevy of nutrients and vitamins supplementing the main ingredients, widening the number and variety of contaminants that may be introduced at the raw ingredient stage or later in the process. X-ray inspection of food is safe, so there are no concerns that it poses a risk to pet food either.
Inline checkweighing, a complementary food quality technology to foreign object detection, helps ensure the weight listed on the product label is the correct weight of each package. This ensures the food processor is not underfilling packages, resulting in hefty fines from regulatory bodies, or “giving away” excessive product by overfilling.
Some checkweighers also can provide feedback to the operator on the filling process. For example, the manufacturer sets a fill level and/or fill amounts for a package. Over time, the filler may drift away from that set point, leading to overfill or underfill. Inline checkweighers regularly are stationed after portioning and packaging. A final check for complete weight usually occurs after case packing, too, to ensure the right number of packages inside each case.
Industrial food metal detectors, which can identify ferrous, non-ferrous, and stainless-steel foreign objects are suitable for a variety of pet foods, such as frozen raw meal or kibble. The metal detector measures magnetic and conductive properties of the packaged product. Any inspected product will have intrinsic magnetic and conductive signals, considered as product effect.
Product effect varies between product and package types—for instance, dry product like kibble will have very low product effect, whereas wet cat food will show significantly more product effect due to its high moisture and salt content. A successful metal detector measurement will minimize product effect and maximize contaminant detection.
To minimize contamination risk and meet Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Point (HACCP) objectives in food safety compliance, metal detection may be used at multiple locations in the process from incoming raw material to molding to final packaging.
Food X-ray inspection equipment provides an image of each package’s contents, allowing inspectors to identify packages with metallic and non-metallic contaminants, such as glass and rubber, as well as broken food pieces and missing components. X-ray inspection is not influenced by product effect or package effect, so it can be used for a wider range of products and packaging materials, especially those made from metalized film and aluminum foil trays.
X-ray inspection can be employed as early as the incoming ingredients stage in place of metal detection, and as late as case packing. Since many pet foods provide a full-diet solution, they may contain a bevy of nutrients and vitamins supplementing the main ingredients, widening the number and variety of contaminants that may be introduced at the raw ingredient stage or later in the process. X-ray inspection of food is safe, so there are no concerns that it poses a risk to pet food either.
Inline checkweighing, a complementary food quality technology to foreign object detection, helps ensure the weight listed on the product label is the correct weight of each package. This ensures the food processor is not underfilling packages, resulting in hefty fines from regulatory bodies, or “giving away” excessive product by overfilling.
Some checkweighers also can provide feedback to the operator on the filling process. For example, the manufacturer sets a fill level and/or fill amounts for a package. Over time, the filler may drift away from that set point, leading to overfill or underfill. Inline checkweighers regularly are stationed after portioning and packaging. A final check for complete weight usually occurs after case packing, too, to ensure the right number of packages inside each case.
Determining the right inspection solution
It is a best practice when considering inspection technology types and models to have inspection equipment vendors conduct a sample test simulating the actual production environment (to the extent possible). Such testing generally comprises a customer shipping product to an equipment manufacturer’s test lab, where it is run through the proposed inspection system. A test report is then provided to the customer with application-specific information such as product handling details, contamination detection limit, check weighing accuracy, etc. This information will not only help determine if the proposed system is the most suitable choice for customer’s application, but also set more detailed expectation of the proposed system.
FAQs
Product effect occurs when a product has a conductive property which affects the magnetic field generated by the food metal detector. This is typically found in high salt, high moisture product environments. For example, wet cat food will show significantly more product effect due to its high moisture and salt content. This negatively impacts the metal detector’s ability to distinguish between actual non-ferrous metal contaminants and the false signal given by the combination of typical product attributes. In these situations, industrial X-ray inspection equipment will produce significantly better results since product effect is not a factor.
There are several points in the pet food production process that benefit from food safety inspection (metal detectors, X-ray inspection) and checkweighing technology. Here are some examples.
- Incoming ingredients. Large pet food producers may require that their vendors meet specific HACCP objectives and provide proof of inspection. Even with those methodologies in place, some will also inspect incoming ingredients. Typical incoming inspection consists of drop through and bulk flow metal detectors.
- After mixing/rendering. Processing equipment such as an industrial blender or mixer will age over time and potentially introduce small particles or shavings of metal into the product being processed. It is important to position inspection equipment after this process equipment to catch any contaminants as early in production as possible, so it doesn’t affect final product quality as well as damage equipment further downstream. The inspection equipment type will depend on the product type and whether its formulation creates a “product effect.” Wet or moist pet food products are more suited toward X-ray equipment, while metal detectors perform well with dry or kibble type pet food products.
- After filling/packing. The recommended inspection equipment type is dependent on the packaging material or combination of materials that have been selected for this product. Metal components such as aluminum foil trays, metal cans, aluminum foil bags or metalized firm structures are much more suited to X-ray inspection. Flexible materials without a metal component, paperboard folding cartons, bags or pouches work very well with either metal detectors or X-Ray inspection systems. At this stage, checkweighers are frequently used in combination with a metal detector or X-ray inspection system to ensure product weight matches information printed on the product label.
- After case packing. After case packing is another good inspection point as this is the last stop before the finished products leave the facility. The recommended inspection equipment type is dependent on the packaging material of the individual product. This is typically done via X-ray inspection. In addition to contaminant detection, the X-ray system’s ability to detect missing pieces will help ensure that the specified count has been loaded into the case. In certain situations, especially when X-ray inspection is not included at the end of the line, checkweighers are placed here to ensure that the proper number of packages are contained inside the case.
Metal detection works very well with dry/kibble pet food and treats that do not have a product effect that wet or moist pet foods do. Metal detection equipment provides reliable, cost-effective protection from even the smallest metal contaminants found in pet food production anywhere in a process. If the packaging material contains metal, x-ray inspection would be the right choice. In addition, if there are other contaminant concerns such as stone, high density plastic or glass, X-ray inspection systems will detect these contaminants as well.
Since wet or moist pet foods have a high product effect, X-ray inspection is the best technology to detect contaminants such as metal, glass, stone, and other dense foreign objects.
To ensure pet food processors are not under or overfilling packages, checkweighers are used to verify the correct weight of each package. Accurate weight avoids giving away costly product or from receiving hefty fines from regulatory bodies for underfilling.
For pet food products in cartons, cans, bottles, or pouches, a chain checkweigher offers line speeds up to 700 packages per minute. It is appropriate for both dry and wet environments.
X-ray inspection of packaged and bulk food products is proven to be extremely safe. There is no documented evidence of adverse health effects of X-rays on equipment operators, the food products that travel through the equipment, and ultimately, the pet consuming those products.
Featured resources
Ensuring Food Safety and Brand Protection for Pet Food Products
A Practical Guide to Checkweighing and Checkweighers
A Practical Guide to Metal Detection and X-ray Inspection of Food
| Type | Title |
|---|---|
| White Paper | Achieve a Higher Level of Food Safety with Selectscan Metal Detection |
| White Paper | Why Multiscanning Technology Improves Metal Detection and Food Safety |
| Infographic | Is X-ray Inspection of Packaged Food Safe? |
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