Rizepoint
SALT LAKE CITY — The food industry has navigated nearly two years of COVID-19-related changes, including auditing shifts, supply change disruptions and staffing shortages. RizePoint CEO Kari Hensien predicts what's ahead in 2022.
"Positive changes are coming next year, as the industry focuses on strengthening the supply chain and prioritizing information-gathering to boost safety and quality efforts. We'll move towards a continuous quality model with more self-assessments and collaborative coaching versus traditional onsite audits. And we'll see tech solutions become more affordable and accessible for food businesses of all sizes," Hensien explained.
Hensien's six predictions for 2022 include:
- A focus on building an agile, resilient supply chain. This is increasingly important after widespread COVID-19-related disruptions.
- Circular (not linear) supply chains. Circular supply chains are greener and more sustainable, and can decrease companies' costs, reduce price volatility and reduce waste.
- An increase in data visibility and recency. Instead of an annual audit, organizations will leverage the Internet of Things and artificial intelligence to increase data points and ensure recency in their knowledge of supply chain performance.
- The rise of collaborative coaching. In 2022, companies will shift from third-party on-site audits to remote collaborative coaching sessions, fostering strong food safety cultures and environments of continuous learning.
- The end of one size fits all. Moving forward, organizations will stop doing the same annual audits for all suppliers. Instead, they'll assess the risk of each supplier and location, build adaptive programs that focus time and effort within supply chain segments and determine where to drive improvement and reduce risk.
- Technology solutions will become more accessible and affordable. Simplified software solutions will help food businesses of any size afford the needed transparency across the supply chain. These modern, game-changing solutions will disrupt a software market previously dominated by complexity and expense.
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