Wednesday, September 30, 2009

CCC Inspection Project.

Hello!

It has been awhile since our last post but we're still here!

We've been working on a third-party supplier auditing program for the cashew industry. Audits are a huge and necessary step to ensure quality and food safety. Audits get us information about conditions and specific companies overseas. Audits funded by the right parties - the roasters and manufacturers in the USA - get us the RIGHT information about conditions overseas. Importers can't do it alone.

And, third party audits are soon going to be law. The Food Safety Enhancement Act of 2009, HR2479, has already passed. Page 51, section xii reads:

the qualified certifying entity shall not be owned, operated, or controlled by a trade association whose member companies operate facilities that it certifies


That's pretty clear. No trade association can do this. It must be third party.

Here is the program we are proposing:

We are all aware that significant quality problems are present in the cashew industry. There is a need to investigate conditions overseas so that manufacturers can come to grips with why problems are occurring, how they can be avoided, and who is reliable. We have assembled a program and with your support, are ready to go forward.

Using seasoned auditors, we will conduct audits of a representative sample of 20 cashew processing facilities at each major origin on an annual basis. Since Brazil has 9 facilities, we will perform at least 69 audits per cycle.

Supporters of this effort will receive, in a timely fashion:

· Access to an expanding data base of audited vendors

· A white paper summarizing the results and assessing the state of the industry, based on analyses from an inspector who has 30 years experience in food safety inspections with a concentration in nuts and dehydrated fruit.

· The full audit report from each facility

Prior to each round of audits (schedule to be announced), supporters will be able to:

* Submit questions for our inspector that directly relate to the issues they want addressed

* Submit specific shippers to be considered for inspection.

By utilizing the pooled support of the industry, the CCC inspection program can provide a world-wide audit program to its supporters at a fraction of what it would cost a single company. And, supporters are advertising themselves as companies that are taking steps to proactively improve the supply of raw cashews.

Our funding goal for this project is $235,000, which will be used to fund the audits, prepare and make available the reports, and for related ancillary expenses. Funds collected in excess of the goal will be rolled over to fund the next round of the CCC inspection project.

If your firm is interested in participating in this collective project, please contact us at info@cashewconcern.com , or 804-745-2848, for more information.



We can do this, and we can do it cheaply if all the stakeholders participate!



Our goal is 100 doners. At that level the cost to each is just $2,350.

Please fill out the non-binding form below and express you support (or tell us to go away).