Autumn 2013
Find inside... • New technology to help safeguard food supply chain • Global agri-business trends for small holder farmers • Unilever drives the sustainability agenda with suppliers • Monitor & measure product consistency
WELCOME TO THE 2013 EDITION OF THE MUDDY BOOTS FOOD-MAG
Dear Readers Since the last edition of the Muddy Boots Magazine the food and farming industry has been thrust into the spotlight once again, this time with ‘horsegate’, the impact still rumbles on with many organisations reporting decreased sales due to consumer confidence in ready meals in general. This once again highlights the growing importance of provenance and the need to be able to demonstrate greater transparency and controls within food supply chains. The role of technology of course will be pivotal! Advances in internet based solutions and cloud technology will continue to erase many of the communications barriers that once existed in the food supply chain. In this edition it would be remiss of me not to announce the launch of our Greenlight Supplier Approval system, this fantastic new easy to use collaborative solution addresses the many challenges you have, and the effort taken in maintaining the approval status of your suppliers. It’s not just food safety that has been in discussion. The government’s plan to invest £160m in farming technology highlights the fact that our food industry is recognised as world class and a core pillar of future development. This will undoubtedly open up new emerging markets especially around sustainable farming practices, food security and supply chain performance. A couple of the articles within this magazine highlight what is already taking place with a number of our customers overseas in response to their changing marketplaces.
As always I would once again like to thank Professor David Hughes for his thought provoking articles as he discusses the implications for small holder farmers in Africa, as its food imports are increasing and food selfsufficiency is declining. His articles continue to ensure we remain abreast of the global trends and the impact they will have on how we shape the future of our businesses We hope you enjoy this edition of your magazine. You too can join in the conversation @MuddyBootsLtd. Best wishes Jonathan
Jonathan Evans Managing Director Muddy Boots Software
CONTENTS
Page 3: Our investment in you. Latest technology from our growing team.
Page 4: Meet our Project Manager. Beth talks about her love of the countryside, her work and Athletics!
Page 5,6: Product Launch! Is the integrity of your supply chain secure? Transform your current supplier compliance process with Greenlight Supplier Approval.
Page 7,8: Professor David Hughes talks about the global agri-business trends and the implications for small holders in Africa.
Page 9: Case Study: Unilever drives sustainability agenda with our Quickfire Audit Management software.
Page 10: Case Study: Holman Fresh monitors and measures product consistency with Greenlight Quality Control.
OUR INVESTMENT IN YOU LATEST TECHNOLOGY TO IMPROVE THE EFFICIENCY & INTEGRITY OF YOUR SUPPLY CHAIN We just had to tell you about all of our new developments and product launches that are due to enter the market soon; each designed with you and your business in mind. Together we can simplify and add rigor to your quality and compliance process; add efficiency to the way you work; help you to manage the complexities of your supply chain; and protect you and your brand from risk.
Tell me more...
Greenlight Supplier Approval Understanding the status of your suppliers and supply chain is a time consuming task, but could avoid serious risk to your reputation. Greenlight Supplier Approval (launch date September 2013) connects you and your suppliers together to make the job of managing the approval status of your suppliers quick and hassle free. Turn to pages 5-6 for more information about this product. Greenlight Grower Management This is an online system that connects the agri-food community to enable them to easily collect, organise and share the complex information required to manage crops and field records. The new mobile App enables farmers and their operators to access, record and share field activity from any location and the automatic, wireless syncing gives customers’ immediate access to important crop information, so there’s no delay in making timecritical decisions.
Greenlight Audit Management App This new iPad App which comes with all of the benefits of touch-screen technology, will simplify the auditing process for our Quickfire customers. Audits were traditionally carried out on a laptop, but this new simpleto-use mobile App will really appeal to the modern customer who needs the convenience of being portable. Quickfire online Our well-established Quickfire audit management software has been given a face-lift! The slick new software, with enhanced usability and user-friendly navigation, will be available to all existing and new Quickfire customers soon. Further information To learn more about any of our software solutions, please visit our web site or contact the sales team: www.muddyboots.com sales@muddyboots.com
Our growing team... So, you’ll see we’ve been busy developing solutions that meet the growing needs of our customers, and with this comes the need to grow our internal operations. We have strengthened every department of the business and created new and exciting roles, such as Key Account Coordinator, Product Adoption Manager, Customer Care Manager and Commercial Head of Food. These new job roles help us to ensure we deliver solutions and expertise that exceed our customers’ expectations, every time.
FRESH THINKING
DID YOU KNOW...?
WORD ON THE TWEET
Total Factor Productivity in the food chain (excluding agriculture) has been rising gradually since 2002 with food manufacture and food wholesale leading the growth.
@Unilever Unilever saves €70m by cutting waste to landfill @FoodManufacture Appointment of #grocerycodeadjudicator is important step in ensuring fairness across the #supplychain #NFU @OliviaMidgley Delivering good food is a daily challenge and requires a different relationships with suppliers #McDonalds
Less than 1 in 5 consumers trust food companies to provide them with safe food. @Mudd
yBoots
Ltd
Fruit prices have risen by 34% since June 2007, rising steadily each year.
MEET THE TEAM MEMBER ... Bethany Hill Project Manager Countryside girl born and bred, spent a brief time in Nottingham but returned to Ross-On-Wye after missing the countryside so much! As a project manager I pick up customer projects in the early stages whether pre or post sale and then remain part of the project until all agreed requirements are delivered- the project management spans from requirements, plan documentation and tracking, customer communications and help with general enquiries to ensure project success. vast variety of working with different
The
customers all with different needs keeps everything very diverse and the satisfaction of delivering integral business systems to our customers that greatly increases their success. Finding a company such as Muddy Boots where there is a vast amount of opportunities in an area where I love to live has allowed me to progress in both my personal and professional life. After recently being involved in several Mudrunning events and duathalons, I’d love to bea professional athlete- that may be a bit too ambitious so I think I’ll stick to my weekend events!
NEW TECHNOLOGY HELPS TO SAFEGUARD THE FOOD SUPPLY CHAIN We have just launched a new innovative product to the market that will help you, your suppliers and their growers meet the requirements set out by your customers. Learn here how Greenlight Supplier Approval works and why now, following 18 months of development, there is real demand in the industry for a comprehensive supplier approval software.
In response to the increased complexity that we’re seeing in the areas of quality and compliance, we have just launched Greenlight Supplier Approval, a new cloud-based software solution that has been designed specifically for the food industry to help manage and simplify the whole supplier approval process.
The Challenges Without accurate visibility of your suppliers, sites and products it’s impossible to have a clear picture on the approval status of your supply chain at any point in time, and whilst the industry has been working towards better transparency for a while, there’s now real recognition that something needs to be done and fast (before the next horse bolts!). Drawing up an action plan to manage your company’s quality control and compliance is one thing, but knowing the quality and integrity of your suppliers and their products is another matter altogether. To minimise risk, information on your suppliers’ levels of compliance, audit/test type, results and frequency needs to be managed on a daily basis, which is a mammoth task without the correct tools in place.
“Traditional paper-based or internal systems are not capable of effectively maintaining this compliance information and without a consistent and collaborative approach, this data which is constantly changing, is rarely joined together to give a real-time view of the status of your suppliers.” Adrian Talbot, Senior Account Manager, Muddy Boots It’s a really disjointed approach that’s hugely challenging for companies, particularly those with complex and globalised supply chains. And because no partners have visibility of what’s actually going on at each stage gate, there’s a heavy reliance on trust that your suppliers will behave the way you expect them to. Let the horsemeat incident serve as an illustration to us that when it comes to compliance, relying on trust alone is a risky strategy.
WELCOME TO A SMARTER WAY OF WORKING...
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Greenlight Supplier Approval offers a comprehensive but really easy way of managing your supplier compliance data; it puts you in control so you can have total confidence that your supply chain is always meeting the required standard. This means you’ll be able to spend more time with your suppliers on value-added tasks. Being a collaborative tool, you and your suppliers can easily access, record, search and share all of the important information relating to the approval status of a supplier, so you can all share the task of supplier compliance. With all of this information held in a centralised, secure location, you are able to map your supply chains from grower to retailer, providing deep visibility and clear transparency of who is in your supply network, where they are located and what products they are supplying to whom. This data is then cross-referenced according to individual retailer audit requirements, giving you assurance that the produce meets the compliance protocol of your end customer. The software really takes the headache out of the whole supplier approval process by doing the hard work for you. It constantly validates the data and sends automatic alerts and notifications to flag-up any impending expiries or deadlines, so you’re only prompted to step-in and take action when the system detects a problem. This not only ensures that your supply chain remains approved at all times, but it significantly reduces the burden and risk of managing and maintaining the data manually.
A secure, online location for managing and maintaining all information relating to the approval status of your suppliers.
Total Visibility A top-down view of your suppliers gives you confidence that your supply network is always approved. Reduce the Admin Burden Automatic validation of data means you are only prompted to take action when the software identifies an issue. Real-time, Accurate Data Alerts and notifications ensure you remain fully informed and encourage a timely response from your suppliers. Mitigate Risk Improved productivity gives you the time and data required to understand your complex supply relationships and sourcing risks.
The simplistic design allows you to easily view the approval status of your supply chains.
Greenlight Supplier Approval is part of our Greenlight network of solutions that manage all aspects of quality and compliance within the food vertical. These solutions are used extensively by world leading brands throughout the supply chain to tackle quality control, audit management, grower management and compliance across the food supply network.
To learn more about this product and to request a copy of the brochure, please email sales@muddyboots.com or visit www.muddyboots.com.
GLOBAL AGRI-BUSINESS TRENDS PROFESSOR DAVID HUGHES: IMPLICATIONS FOR SMALL HOLDERS IN AFRICA
Africa’s food imports are increasing and food selfsufficiency is declining. This should create substantial local and regional marketing opportunities for African farmers and this will include smallholders, but only if certain conditions are met. Over the next 40 years, the global population will increase by 2 billion but that will not be evenly spread – Africa will double from 1 billion to 2 billion people and the jury is out on whether this will offer an exceptional food marketing opportunity for African farmers or translate into massive social problems in the overgrown cities and rural areas abandoned by younger adults. Cities in Africa will mushroom in size and the hope is that the burgeoning urban populace will have paid employment and plenty of it. If not, shanty town social unrest will inevitably result which could be exacerbated if, as pundits and indeed FAO predict, global food prices will be both increasingly volatile and higher in the future. Accelerated urbanisation suits supermarket companies. Walmart’s arrival in South Africa with its purchase of Massmart is a statement of intent to expand rapidly across the sub-Sahara region. It will experience
competition from regional mass retailers who have indepth knowledge of the purchasing preferences of local shoppers. This is good news for consumers who should see keener grocery prices but will be tough for duka (small store) owners who will lobby government to keep the big global retailers out (as has been attempted in India). But rapid population growth and urbanisation in Africa will place enormous strain on food security across the continent. Africa’s food imports are increasing and food self-sufficiency is declining. Clearly, this should create substantial local and regional marketing opportunities for African farmers and this will include smallholders but only if certain conditions are met: roads, transport and post-harvest infrastructure are improved; regional trade agreements within Africa are forged and trade between African countries is encouraged not constrained (it’s easier to ship produce to Europe or the Gulf than it is to move it within the continent or, indeed, the next door country); slowly and painfully, the structure of farming and wholesaling will rationalise as in all other parts of the globe, with or without government facilitation.
“EXTRA-REGIONAL MARKETS WILL CONTINUE TO OFFER GOOD PROSPECTS FOR AFRICAN FARMERS.”
Supermarkets will accelerate the transformation of supply chains for, in particular, fresh food as they seek greater quantities of consistent quality produce. Can smallholder farmers survive in a modern food marketing era? Some will, some won’t. Those heading for the cities will be pleased to leave the land. Smallholders remaining will expand but will require help in terms of access to credit, technology and so on. They must work together and with modern wholesalers to meet big buyer requirements. Smallholder farmers are disadvantaged but not doomed and will find opportunities where they can maximise their intrinsic advantages, such as use of family labour, attention to detail on finicky crops, and close proximity to markets as towns and cities expand rapidly. Traditional markets have decades of life in them and will continue to offer wholesale and retail market opportunities for the smaller producer. Within Africa, the processed food industry will grow quickly and prove a reliable market outlet for large- and small-scale producers. Fresh fruit and vegetables destined for developed countries and, increasingly, the fast-growing middle classes of emerging countries will be most likely captured by larger-scale farming enterprises with opportunities for “outgrowers” supplementing nucleus estate production. But tea, coffee and cocoa (the principal raw ingredient for chocolate) are grown largely on smallholder farms across Africa and elsewhere. Worrisomely, not is all well on these farms – incomes are low and unstable reflecting poor on-farm productivity, volatile prices and inefficient supply chains; and farmers are ageing and their children seek jobs in town not on the land. But, there is a silver lining – major companies such as Nestlé, Unilever, Mars, Kraft
and Barry Callebaut recognise that continuing poor productivity at the farm level presents a clear threat to the long-term sustainability of their own big branded businesses. These global companies share common commercial interest with small-scale farmers in working together to improve quality, quantity and farm level prices to ensure that the raw materials for mega-brands such as Mars bars, Magnum ice cream, Kit-Kat and Cadbury’s and Milka chocolate are available in years to come. Global food and beverage companies forging closer partnerships with small-scale African farmers may seem most unlikely but, in fact, it is the emerging model for the coming decades.
Professor David Hughes, Emeritus Professor of Food Marketing profdavidhughes@aol.com +44 (0) 7798558276 http://www.profdavidhughes.com/
UNILEVER DRIVING THE SUSTAINABILITY AGENDA WITH SUPPLIERS By 2030 world food production will have to increase by 50% to meet the growing need for food within a growing population. This will have potentially damaging effects on the environment. Unilever has been working to manage its environmental impact for over a decade and as part of the company’s campaign to highlight its sustainability credentials to consumers, they enlisted our help in 2007.
The objective was to quantify suppliers’ progress against the indicators in Unilever’s Sustainable Agriculture Code; their long-standing 11-point sustainability programme. 5 years on and this is the story so far... For Unilever to achieve its ambitious growth and sustainability objectives, the company’s environmental impact had to be reduced throughout their supply chain. The key focus is managing sustainable supply in-line with the company’s sustainability agenda; this includes raw materials, production process and distribution. To achieve this goal, Muddy Boots has deployed its selfassessment solution across Unilever’s fresh produce supply chain. Loaded with the Unilever Sustainable Agriculture Code (part of the Unilever Sustainable Living Plan - USLP) the tool is enabling Unilever and their suppliers to track and monitor progress and create evidence-based improvement plans. “Quickfire from Muddy Boots Software enables our suppliers to self-assess themselves against Unilever’s
Code and identify good stories or areas for improvement,” explains Andrea Granier, Procurement Operation Manager, Sustainable Sourcing, Unilever. “The Quickfire Reporting Tool allows us to spot trends in the industry which can be broken down by individual supplier, country and product. As a result, we are able to see immediately what and where the issues are and what needs to be improved. This is achieved at the click of a mouse instead having to review mounds of paper”. “Understanding we have to make a real difference in sustainability terms and being able to communicate this through our brands is leading us to create new ways of working with our suppliers,” continues Granier. “By introducing the sustainable initiative to fresh produce, our communication down the supply chain has significantly improved. We now know how many suppliers we have, their locations and what they are supplying to us; this level of transparency is key to that drive for sustainability.” For more information about the USLP please visit: http://www.unilever.com/sustainable-living/
So far, over 185 of our key suppliers are reaping the benefits of Quickfire and we are actively working with Muddy Boots on improvements and future implementations, such as the new online data collection and flexible reporting platforms that will be delivered in 2013. We conduct an annual Customer Satisfaction Survey and Supplier Focus Groups to really involve suppliers in programme development. We aim to have 200 suppliers on board by the end of 2013 and significantly increase the total number of assessments submitted (we saw an increase in submissions of over 350% between 2011 and 2012). Andrea Granier, Procurement Operation Manager, Sustainable Sourcing, Unilever
HOLMAN FRESH MONITOR & MEASURE PRODUCT CONSISTENCY Holman Fresh, a leading fresh produce supplier in Australia, has implemented our Greenlight Quality Control software to monitor and measure product consistency across their supply chain. Here, Jason Considine, Muddy Boots General Manager ANZ speaks with Patricia Bowlby, Product Technologist at Holman Fresh, to discuss their objectives for using our software and the reason Muddy Boots was selected.
As a member of the Freshmax Group, Holman Fresh serves a global customer base of 25 countries across four continents and is a leading Australian fresh produce supplier. They are passionate about produce and are committed to quality and freshness. To maintain its reputation as a supplier of quality produce with an efficient distribution system, Holman Fresh selected our Greenlight Quality Control software. The software has been comprehensively embedded into the Holman Fresh business model to measure and monitor product consistency across the entire supply chain, from field to fork.
Muddy Boots Software General Manager, Jason Considine explains ; “The Greenlight Quality Control solution utilises web and mobile based technology tailored to the Holman Fresh business to keep all stakeholders informed with up-to-the minute information on results or activity data enabling prompt action on daily quality and performance issues.” The major investment is designed to complement the Holman Fresh mission – to remain at the forefront of innovation in the vibrant Australian fresh produce industry.
Patricia Bowlby, Product Technologist at Holman Fresh, says; “We have developed a regional quality control and supply pathway plan to ensure product quality and customer specifications are met and managed at each critical part of the supply chain.”
WHAT IS GREENLIGHT QUALITY CONTROL? Greenlight Quality Control enables a 360° lens for technical and commercial teams to view both site and product performance. By adopting a paperless, data-driven process our customers have transparency on performance across their supply chain to identify any issues and arrive at source. To learn more about Greenlight Quality Control, call us on +44 (0)1989 780540 or e-mail sales@muddyboots.com.
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