Small Steps in Sanitary Design

Sanitary design—design of facilities and equipment with the goal of facilitating food safety controls—is a well-known tool in the food safety toolbox. Sanitary design is an approach that has an impact on many critical programs, including pest management, cleaning, maintenance, microbial control, and allergen control.

Many food manufacturers feel frustrated with their building or equipment and see areas within the facility that hinder good food safety practices, but they believe that it will take large capital expenditures to make improvements. While many improvements do take large investments, it is important to recognize that there are opportunities for small advances in sanitary design.

Fitting doors with self-closing devices is one such step. When placed on doors to the exterior, this supports pest exclusion. When placed on interior doors, such as between maintenance areas or sanitation wash areas and product or production areas, the risk of cross contamination is reduced. Another relatively easy change that can be made is that of equipment accessibility. Often, panels on equipment that need to be removed for preventive maintenance or cleaning are secured with an excessive number of screws. These screws often can be replaced with a limited number of latches that can be opened quickly, reducing the amount of time needed to gain access and to re-secure panels. This modified design also increases the likelihood that the scheduled activity will happen. As you implement improvements in design, keep in mind the impact to occupational safety. Some of the hindrances to equipment access are intentional to protect employees from moving parts or other dangerous elements.

Other small advances include installation of hands-free faucets and paper-towel dispensers, turning square tube framework at a 45-degree angle to reduce collection of debris, eliminating product spillage points in a line, installing sling guards around agitator shafts, and eliminating rough or spot welds. An evaluation of your operation with a keen eye will likely reveal several small, yet significant, opportunities for improvement.

A further step in sanitary design which can be taken immediately is establishing a checklist of elements for review and approval related to the acquisition of new equipment. This would include an assessment of appropriate materials, such as no wood, no glass, and no brittle plastic, and an evaluation of specific elements, such as ease of accessibility, smooth surfaces, inaccessible crevices or joints, bearing locations, product and debris collection points, and slopes towards product zones. Standards such as the Baking Industry Sanitary Standards Committee (BISSC) or the 3-A Sanitary Standards can help generate ideas for the content of such a checklist. While equipment acquisition is not likely to be frequent, having a well-thought out set of standards for approval will help ensure that when it does happen, it is enhancing and not inhibiting food safety.

Your call to action is to identify “small wins” in the area of sanitary design that can be addressed with few resources and big payoffs. Putting efforts toward prevention will not only reduce food safety risks, but will help to reduce the costs associated with ineffective design. Small steps lead to big change; take a step today.

The author is Vice President of Food Safety Education, AIB International.