Roundtable: Supply chain food safety

Meet the experts
- Muhammad Khalid Saeed, food health inspection officer, Dubai Municipality
- Sascha Triemer vice president — culinary, Atlantis, The Palm
- Jéan Van Der Westhuizen executive chef — Middle East, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Unilever Food Solutions
- Sunjeh Raja director and CEO, International Centre for Culinary Arts (ICCA)
- Marc Hayes executive chef Arabia, Unilever Food Solutions
- Evangelos Karakoulias F&B manager, DoubleTree by Hilton Dubai — Jumeirah Beach.
- Jason Pettit brand chef, the noodle house, Jumeirah Restaurants LLC
- Jay Williams executive sous chef, Westin and Le Méridien Mina Seyahi
- Collin Kaskel chef de cuisine, West 14th Restaurant, Oceana Beach Resort
- Antonello Manca executive chef, Dusit Thani Dubai

In association with Unilever Food Solutions, Caterer Middle East rounded up the experts to discuss supply chain issues, and how to better improve the relationship between operators, distributors and manufacturers

One of the most important aspects of a kitchen is the quality of the ingredients that come through the door. The supply chain has multiple layers, where it goes from the manufacturer to supplier and then finally to the chefs.

Caterer Middle East and Unilever Food Solutions meets the experts to find out what are the specific issues faced during “goods in”, whether there are any solutions, and how the industry can improve overall standards.

What are the concerns you have, if any, surrounding receiving products?
Jéan Van Der Westhuizen, executive chef — Middle East, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Unilever Food Solutions: What we want to talk about is the full chain, so from those that manufacture the product, what are we putting in place with distributors to make sure you receive the product in a safe manner.

Because obviously the consequences of not receiving it, or contaminating it, or having issues with the product could be devastating not only for your reputations but ours as well.

If you wanted to start it from the source where we manufacture, you could ask, are we doing enough to audit the distributors to make sure we get a product of the highest quality? The hard work that we do in manufacturing those products, that all goes out of the window if we don’t audit distributors.

Sascha Triemer, vice president culinary, Atlantis, The Palm: I think the training starts really from the source. First of all, if you’re in Dubai, you mainly have distributors — you don’t have the suppliers from the source except a few local ones because most of the products come from overseas.

Any new supplier or distributor we hire, we audit before they can be registered and every six months that has to be carried out again. And then the biggest critical point is the receiving, when it comes in and is accepted.

The training for the procurement team is critical for the entire operation. There’s a checklist in place where they can tick it off and physically check it; we have spot checks by the health and safety department to verify that that process has been done.

Jay Williams, executive sous chef, Westin and Le Méridien Mina Seyahi: We had a chef who is rostered in there for six hours every day with the receiving department. So they can learn from the chef and then if we have new products coming into the hotel we will actually train the receiving guys on what that product is, we’ll show it to them and we cook it for them and they taste it, because if they know what it is, they will have a bit more passion about their job.

Evangelos Karakoulias, F&B manager, DoubleTree by Hilton Dubai — Jumeirah Beach: Sometimes they get overloaded, and they really can’t cope with the numbers. Within half an hour they get everyone coming at the same time, and there’s the challenge.

People would keep the long checklist on the side and just receive the products, some of them will skip it. This is why we introduced random audits from the kitchen, and from other departments there would be a quality audit. Receiving clerks usually belong to the financing department, like general purchasing, and we want them to be trained exactly how the chefs are trained.

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Antonello Manca, executive chef, Dusit Thani Dubai: I think receivers should be part of the culinary team. Maybe we need to turn around and say we should take this under our wing, because it belongs to the kitchen, it doesn’t belong to accounts. Plus it’s very important that we try to minimise the time [of the products] outside, having the receiving as close as possible to the gates.

Muhammad Khalid Saeed, food health inspection officer, Dubai Municipality: From the municipality perspective, Dubai is importing 90-95% food from outside. This means we are exposed to all the problems around us. We are pushing the hospitality industry to implement a proper supplier approval system, which is the weakest part right now.

We have the middleman, ie the trading company, where the food safety standards are lower than the hospitality industry. The problem is whether they have the traceability system in place, whether they will give you the recall notification, and so on.

We are asking trading companies to look into these. You cannot control things with the receiving alone — most of the receivers are not properly trained.

Sunjeh Raja, director and CEO, International Centre for Culinary Arts (ICCA): As trainers, manufacturers do a good job and the end-user is completely strong. The weakest link is the distributor… he’s a trader and he’s only trying to trade.

Three years back we were sending our student to the Norwegian Cruise Lines and we were surprised they were using trained chefs from us to be at receiving stations. We learned that it all depends on training, it’s not just about filling forms.

It’s about showing the paperwork is sound, but sometimes the spirit lacks. The manufacturer sends the product out with great intent and content, but it changes hands. So it’s no use the kitchen being HACCP-compliant when something has already gone wrong.

Jason Pettit, brand chef, the noodle house, Jumeirah Restaurants LLC: It would be nice if traders had a passion for what they were doing. They don’t understand the products so they don’t invest the time and energy for training. When you see the delivery drivers, you can’t believe they’re delivering food.

Triemer: That’s why it’s very important to have those supplier audits because then you realise and cut them out. Some suppliers are really, really good and even the delivery men are wearing hairnets and complying with everything. But there are others who don’t do it.

Pettit: We’re lobbying the drivers and suppliers because we want the food to be the best quality when it comes in. The guys who do the receiving are starting their journey in catering. So you can’t expect them to have the knowledge and passion that you’ve got.

Unfortunately for some of us, we don’t have massive budgets of staff so we’re relying on suppliers to play their part and send good quality, well-packaged products ... they get audited by the Jumeirah corporate side and we’re the end user. The flip side is that if you reject a delivery you might not get it for two days.

That’s one of the pressure points. Chefs think, maybe it’s not that bad, sign it and take it. Drivers are not supposed to deliver between 12pm and 2:30pm because that’s peak lunch trade. One o’clock and they’ll rock up.

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Collin Kaskel, chef de cuisine, West 14th Restaurant, Oceana Beach Resort: And they’ll take the food out, leaving it outside until you have time to come down. They don’t care. I’ve had food which I’ve refused, I’ve asked them to come take their stuff back and they don’t.

Triemer: That’s where training comes into play; you have to trust people because you can’t literally stand there. The health and safety department plays a role.

Williams: We have a third party come in and do audits three or fours times a year. Laws change quite often so at least if they’re coming three or four times, we are up-to-date. And because we’re on the operational side we don’t necessarily see what is wrong.

Manca: I will give you an example — I was passing by receiving, there was truffle cream in a glass jar and it was really hot. I said, ‘it is nearly 50 degrees’ and the driver said, ‘but this is a dry store item’. He doesn’t know — for him, it’s not a chilled item.

So we had to return it and call the supplier immediately. For certain products we don’t have much of a choice because they come from specific suppliers. We are cornered and have to find a compromise otherwise we don’t get the product.

Saeed: What we are looking at is that the supplier should deliver their product to the hotel at the right temperature. HACCP or a food safety management system addresses this till delivery, until which time the supplier is responsible.

We introduced a transportation approval system just to make sure that the vehicle used for the food transportation is approved. We advise the industry that in case of non-conformity from any supplier, ask them to send a corrective action report.

Marc Hayes, executive chef Arabia, Unilever Food Solutions: Training, how to treat the products, how to transport them is very important. Some of our items, like our mayonnaise which is a dry store item, needs to be kept at ambient room temperature, which in the Middle East is not what it is in Europe, which is at 18-22°C.

We do audit but whether we do this often enough, once every six months… that’s very interesting, the point about corrective action. How far back does that go?

Pettit: Do you track and monitor suppliers who have complaints?

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Saeed: When the situation is really bad, the hygiene manager reports to us unofficially. Similarly you can officially log in a complaint.

Pettit: In the essence of searching for a solution, I have to say I believe it’s two parts. One is from the chefs when you receive your products. You reject the products or sometimes you have to take those things. But if you go a step further and say alright we received mayonnaise today, I know it’s from Food Solutions, I’m rejecting it, but let me drop a mail to my sales representative at Food Solutions and make them aware of that.

We, as food producers, need to take a lot more responsibility, instead of creating the product and sending it to the distributor and expecting everything to be fine and dandy. There’s a number of things we can do to improve.
One, we need to realise there’s a problem and admit we need to provide solutions. One of those should include investing in training for these distributors. If we spent some more money on investing in their training, how much product and how much waste we would reduce?

Distributors need to understand the consequences of their waste or mishandling of product especially when it comes to temperature and it’s up to businesses like us to take action where it really matters.

And that’s in terms of the rebates and the relationships and the deals and the contracts that we have. The health and safety aspect is not being put as part of that contract. It’s about how much growth, how much profitability, how many products are you selling to each customer.

There’s got to be something in that document to support the safety of the food as well and the consequences if you don’t adhere to those stringent contract points. That is a perfect world, but it has got to start somewhere. We’re scared to say that Dubai is a third-world place but underneath it’s still brewing like that and we’ve got to actively take a step forward.

Williams: It has improved though. I’ve only been here six years but seen definite improvement in food safety. The suppliers are starting to take it seriously, the products we’re getting now are of much higher standard. I think it comes from reputation as well. Chefs talk to each other and we’ll tell each other about good and bad suppliers. The good suppliers are getting better and the bad suppliers are slowly getting cut out.

Raja: You’ve got a very smart person trying to sell the food but the person supplying it is very different. Unless the training goes deeper to the person delivering the food... His job is just to drive and deliver, and he is carrying diverse inventory. There are many practical challenges, and ground level realities are very different.
You might have a perishable and dry food item moving together, but for him it’s all the same thing.

Karakoulias: They are on pressure, and have to deliver to different hotels. When you go for inspection inside the truck, they put pressure on you and say they need to rush so we cannot take the time to check temperature and conditions.

Saeed: Most of the training is not job-oriented. The food safety manager and training companies use basic food hygiene training. Those contents have everything related to cooking, cross-contamination; I don’t think the receiver has to know all these things. It is much better if we redesign our training according to the job responsibility.

Westhuizen: I like the suggestion — rather than teaching the entire HACCP process which might go over their heads, deliver a short training programme only to the drivers, or those stacking products.

Raja: Elsewhere in the world, you need a multi-level certification, even your driver handling food to have a very specific focus or certification… that’s very common. Receiving is a very serious job in itself, it’s the entry-point of food coming inside.

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What would you expect happens once you send a product back to a supplier?
Kaskel: I would expect them to test it, but I’m going to guarantee that they’re not going to and the delivery guy will put it in the garbage.

Pettit: That goes back to my point earlier, that they are traders and have no passion for their product. The companies that have tried to be responsible, they are the ones who are succeeding and they are the ones we are moving towards.

Triemer: If you reject the product, there needs to be a link where the municipality has a database that shows it’s been sent back. It’s very complex to make that work.

Raja: It should not go back to the source or the supplier, it should find its way somewhere else… otherwise it will find its way back in the system and go somewhere else. If it’s too bad for consumption or very serious, it should go somewhere to get condemned.

Pettit: It would be great if all the operators had a big stamp that said: ‘Rejected!’. The problem is if the driver turns up in the middle of a busy shift, then I don’t necessarily have time to call the supplier. The driver doesn’t necessarily understand because he’s not educated perhaps. You’ve got no control over what he’s sent. He will send it to somebody else the next day.

Saeed: Communicate that cause to the supplier. If you’re communicating that to the driver, then what’s the point? Communicate to the right person in the industry.

Manca: Will they take it seriously? Can we send an email, or will they if it’s coming from the municipality? Can we write an email and copy in the municipality?

Saeed: Yes you can. I’m getting regular calls from Atlantis about food safety issues, so you can do so as well. What we normally do is, when we see that the issue is very serious, we pass it on to the inspector and go and verify. We want you to be open with us.

Do products get sent back over quality or food safety?
Williams: More quality, but sometimes food safety. It’s not generally the product itself but it will be the temperature coming in, the cleanliness of the delivery vehicle.

Pettit: Dirty packaging. Bean sprouts coming in dirty cardboard.

Hayes: We’ve been lucky enough that some of our customers have complained about our product to us. When we investigated, we found that the distributor hadn’t stacked it properly. Sometimes we’re lucky that people inform us about it because if they send it back with the driver and nothing else gets said, we’ll never know about it.

Westhuizen: We’ve got people in the business that dedicate their hours every day to customer complaints and supply chain issues and looking at R&D related issues, and you’re right. The best is to get in touch with suppliers and manufacturers. Because we’re able to really get the problem sorted out at the source.

If you had to sum up the biggest concern you have right now over this topic, what would it be? Any solutions?
Kaskel: My biggest issue would be the actual delivery of the product. You talk to the sales rep and they say it’s the best product ever. And then you get it, and it’s on this truck in a dirty box and… sweat dripping in it, and you’re like, I can’t! I think suppliers are now doing much better quality-wise but from point A to point B, that’s where it gets lost.

Pettit: I agree, it’s that final, bringing it to the receiving area. It’s critical and some suppliers have recognised that and use uniforms, hairnets, and are diligent and you feel quite confident in them as a supplier. They use polystyrene packaging, things on ice… but then I’m relying on the guy receiving at the time. It could be a steward or I could be lucky and it’s one of my white jackets who will reject it if it’s a problem. If it’s during a busy lunch rush, my chefs are cooking.

Williams: It’s education. People are going through the training but not sincerely absorbing information. It needs to make people actually care about what’s going on and understand what happens if they don’t follow procedures.

Triemer: If you had the choice of getting everything from one supplier who complies with everything, it would be easier but here you have to deal with different distributors. Some take it more seriously than others. And many people come in contact with food… it’s not just the F&B side. You think, ‘I’m not cooking’ — but you are delivering food. There needs to be an education process, with accountability.

Karakoulias: We have to give all the tools to the receiving team to do their job properly, training, HACCP awareness; we are also doing the LobsterInk course on food safety.

Hayes: The transportation. From leaving the warehouse to reaching the kitchen is a very weak link.

Westhuizen: That link is important; bringing the users of our products closer to us in the age of multimedia... we have ambitions to bring that gap closer. If you receive a product from us which you’re not happy with, you can get in touch with us immediately. That’s what we are working towards.

Raja: Receiving is the most important missing link, so we need to have a standardised training for the receiving. Manufacturers play a lead role in training the distributor. It’s your brand and has to reach the end consumer the way you want it.

Saeed: The most important thing is the top management commitment. The second is the sourcing of the supplier. The last thing is communicating non-conformity with the supplier and pushing them to take action.

Manca: Communication with the municipality because they are our partner, and being strict with the distributors. If everyone is pushing in the same direction there will be growth as well.