Bühler: Improving food safety with digital solutions

“One-third of all food is wasted or never reaches consumers in the first place,” says Johannes Wick, CEO of the Grains & Food business. “By applying digital solutions, we are making targeted efforts to make food production more sustainable and safer,” says Wick. Bühler is presenting innovations such as sensor technologies for pasta production, predictive maintenance of durum processing systems, or consistent process monitoring based on new sorting technologies.”
 

Demand for more transparency in the food chain is increasing. Alarmed by food scandals and in response to increasing environmental awareness, consumers are demanding uncompromising safety standards in connection with foods as well as a transparent food chain – from the field to fork. Legislators around the world are also pressing for the traceability of feeds and foods. Some years ago, the European Union implemented strict regulations to this end, and laws in the United States have become more stringent with the recently introduced Food Safety Modernization Act (FSMA). But how can foods be retraced? The related food processing data are now readily available thanks to digital solutions rolled out by Bühler. “With digitalization and the Internet of Things, we are in a position to launch entirely new services enabling our customers to gain greater transparency in their production processes,” explains Wick.

 
“Digitalization is an important driver in our aim to reduce energy consumption and food waste in the production process by 30 percent,” says Ian Roberts, CTO of Bühler. Smart automation solutions enable customers to decrease their retracing and monitoring administration requirements from material reception to loadout by as much as 80 percent. The potential of new digitalization solutions in the food industry is enormous: in 2017, Bühler already launched ten digital solutions. Another 50 additional ones are currently under development.

 
Sensors make for more taste and higher quality
Bühler is launching its sensor innovation PastaSense at the Ipack Ima 2018. This solution for the first time offers pasta-makers the opportunity of monitoring the entire process from raw materials to the end product by sensor technology. It eliminates the need for costly manual checks. The sensors applied in this innovative technology analyze the composition and color characteristics of the raw materials and the finished pasta products throughout the production process, supplying pasta producers with real-time information on moisture, protein, and ash contents as well as product color and possible discolorations. This enables them to enhance the quality of their products and to respond quickly and in a targeted manner to production errors. Fewer manual checks and lower production losses allow the capital investment to be fully paid back within one year.

 
The Zonda roaster for cocoa beans, nuts, and malt uses smart technology to improve the roasting process, which is crucial for obtaining the required product fragrance, taste and color. No matter whether cocoa beans, nuts, or seeds are being processed, thousands of roasting profiles can be tailored individually. The heart of this system is a sensor that measures the core moisture of the product to be roasted. Using visualization systems and dashboard solutions, roasting masters can improve control over the process and thereby increase the quality of their products. This allows them to better position themselves, particularly in the premium segment.

 
Predictive maintenance
With its Osiris vertical grinder, Bühler is for the first time presenting at the Ipack Ima a grinder for durum millers which is completely equipped with diamond technology. This innovation achieves a throughput capacity of up to 12 tons of grain per hour. Customers also benefit from cloud-based maintenance options. Predictive maintenance allows them to perceptibly reduce maintenance costs and downtimes.

 
Bühler & Microsoft commit to improving the availability of safe and healthy food
Meanwhile, at Hannover Messe, Bühler and Microsoft have committed to building a powerful alliance that will increase the availability of safe food and enhance food integrity and traceability. The aspired alliance will extend the partnership the two companies have just built. Microsoft and Bühler aim to roll out cloud-based solutions to eliminate contaminated grains and to rapidly introduce new services to improve the availability of safe and healthy food. An important part of the planned cooperation is block-chain applications, whose feasibility is currently being evaluated.
 

Food safety and availability is still one of the most demanding global challenges. While 30 percent of all food is lost or wasted, 800 million people are starving. The application of digital technologies, such as offered by Microsoft’s Azure cloud, artificial intelligence and blockchain technologies, combined with inspection and processing technologies of Bühler and partners, will provide transparency and greater efficiency in food value chains.

 
“Bühler impressively demonstrates that manufacturers can be digital innovators, by strategically combining their industry-specific know-how with artificial intelligence, intelligent cloud and IoT solutions,” says Çağlayan Arkan, General Manager Worldwide Manufacturing at Microsoft. Calvin Grieder, Chairman of the Bühler Board of Directors, adds: “By interweaving Microsoft’s capabilities and Bühler’s innovations for food safety and availability, we strive to stand up to some of the most pressing issues in the global food system.”

 
New opportunities emerge
New technologies such as blockchain applications have an immense potential to enable full traceability within food value chains. They could be key to ensuring food integrity and in the fight against food fraud. “We live in exciting times; digitalization has now reached the global food system,” says Bühler CTO Ian Roberts – reason enough for the two industry leaders Microsoft and Bühler to explore the technological and business opportunities together.