Each day, we try to focus on eating healthy to build our immunity with nutritious food. Farm products such as food grains, fruits and vegetables form a key part of a good diet plan. However, consumers often may have questions on whether they are receiving fresh produce or not. Farmer Producer Organisations (FPOs) in India like Goda Farm work with farmers and sellers to maintain quality across the food traceability system to deliver quality agricultural produce.
Below are key areas where quality is maintained through strict guidelines by FPOs in the food traceability system:
- Farming Methods:
Who are the farmers growing the crops? What are the methods that use to grow and harvest the crop? The FPOs maintain a proper record of the market requirement and assign farmers to meet those requirements on time. The network of farmers receives guidance on sustainable farming practices through support centres too.
Events are conducted in collaboration with educational institutions to update farmers with research insights and to help them with solutions to farming-related challenges. By giving farmers a platform for knowledge exchange and other support, the quality standards of the farm produce are ensured by FPOs.
- Infrastructure for storage:
If there is a future requirement to be met and excess produce need to be stored, there should be infrastructure available for farmers. FPOs provide the required storage space to farmers for ensuring minimum wastage of harvested farm products.
- Packaging and labelling best practices:
Once the farmers provide the harvested crops to FPOs, these crops are handled as per the labelling and packaging guidelines put forth by regulatory authorities. The primary and secondary packaging depends on the transportation and properties of the produce. The exact details of the source with storage guidelines and consumption guidelines should be mentioned on the label of the packaged product.
If the produce gets spoilt while in transit, the appropriate recall procedures are to be followed. To ensure that miscreants don’t sell the spoilt products in the market, steps should be taken to dispose the recalled products in an environment-friendly manner. Further, a systematically-managed supply chain will have action steps for addressing the supply gap due to the recalled products. FPOs are aware of the challenges and have a tracking system in place to ensure the set protocols are followed.
To discuss farm-to-plate best practices for quality assurance with experts from Goda Farm, contact info@godafarm.com
