In recent years, as Japan's shrinking workforce becomes more apparent, interest in further automation of food production processes has been growing. As one of the automation of the production process, a wide variety of food products have been developed and put to practical use one after another, such as automatic food preparation using robots (including highly automated machines), fixed quantity serving of processed food, and so on.

Food machinery and equipment must take GHP (Good Hygienic Practice) into consideration, and the GFSI (Global Food Safety Initiative) has defined in Scope J1 of its benchmark requirements that risk assessment should be conducted to reduce hazard factors. Analysis of hazard factors (hazards) related to food machinery has already been established by Food Machinery JIS (JIS B 9650-2) and other standards, but no specific consideration was given to robots used in food processing and manufacturing processes when the standards were created.
 

The Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries' “Sanitation Management Guidelines for Food Manufacturing Facilities Implementing and Operating Robots, etc. (2024)” refers to the analysis of hygienic hazard factors for such robots. In this year's forum, the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries' New Food Industry Department and Connected Robotics Inc. will report on their analysis of the main hazard factors, and Maxvalu Tokai Co., Ltd will report on their case study of introducing robots into food processing and manufacturing lines. Through these reports, we aim to help disseminate information on the introduction of robots and other advanced automation technologies into food processing and manufacturing processes.

Please read more and register here.