Global technologies in progress

Prepared Foods, April, 1997 by Daniel Best

As commercial borders dissolve, technology becomes fluidized. It moves between countries and establishes the parameters whereby companies and even nations compete with one another.

In the post-Cold War growth economy, product technologies that have demonstrated their appeal in middle-America Peoria may go on to duplicate their success in Shanghai or New Delhi. Reverse technology transfers occur as well.

In this new world economy, the success of large international food ingredient and equipment suppliers - many which provide food technology as well - underscores the global nature of both the food industry and the science upon which it is based. This explains, in large part, why events such as the "International Food Industry Manufacturing Week," held last October in Paris and attended by over 50,000 international visitors, offer "must-see" previews of the global food manufacturing arena.

The exhibit structure was specifically designed "to foster international cross-pollination," according to Jean-Pierre Bonvallet, general manager for IPA, the umbrella organization for the expositions.

With the stated objective of being the "world's most comprehensive food equipment show," IPA '96 offered a three-sector technological overview of the food industry's newest and emerging technologies: MATIC covered meat products; SIEL showcased dairy and liquid products; and GIA targeted solid food processing. Meanwhile, across town, SIAL provided trade-show participants with a world view of the finished outcomes of technology (see sidebar). Here is a sampling:

A Stand-up Performer

Economy and simplicity lie behind Thimonier's (St. Germain de Mont D'Or, France) flexible, low-cost UHT and aseptic (retortable) pouches. Designed to rival conventional packaging alternatives, the basic Doypack stand-up pouch, already familiar to U.S. consumers of Capri Sun beverages, is about to take a major step forward with variations that include a reclosable top and a clear product window.

Purported advantages of their system include low-cost and off-the-shelf packaging materials, good graphic presentation, fill rates of up to 6,000 200-500 ml. units/hr., and good source reduction properties. Once emptied, there is virtually no package waste, explains Thimonier executive Patrick Doyen.

Product applications for the retortable Doypack range from beverages (milk and juice) to soups, sauces, rice dishes, yogurts, cheeses, and pet foods, and particulate size is not a problem. "The packages lend themselves to microwaving and home freezing," adds Doyen.

Novel Pasteurizers

Fluid processing comes naturally to Actini S.A., an Evian, France-based company that built its reputation as a pasteurizer of mineral water and dairy products. The company is now turning its sights on soy milk. But just how popular is this beverage?

Simply put, Actini is on a mission, says Jean-Pierre Francotte, senior executive. The company sees low-cost, self-contained, soy-milk processing units as a critically important solution to malnutrition. However, recent consumer interest in soy's potential for reducing heart disease, cancer and osteoporosis suggests that demand for this processing technology may be more broadly based. Given the current consumer interest in soy products, the Agrolactor pasteurizer warrants a new look.

The soy milk processing unit is superficially simple: Soybeans and other raw ingredients go in one end and sweetened, flavored soy-milk comes out the other. Soybeans are crushed and filtered using a patented system while water is sterilized with ultraviolet light. Other ingredients are added prior to sterilization or pasteurization. The beverage is pasteurized, cooled, and packaged. Processing byproducts can be used for animal food. The unit is small, easily movable and has a production rate of 250 liters/hour (62 gallons/hr.).

Actini also featured its ohmic heating systems and its "tri-lobe" heat exchange tube, designed to optimize heat transfer into viscous and particulate-containing products while minimizing thermal abuse. Actini's "Actijoule" ohmic-heating systems are used in fruit, dairy and egg-pasteurization. The "Steril'oeuf" ohmic pasteurizer allows pasteurization temperatures to be reached quickly, minimizing heat abuse. Actini anticipates that its technology will soon capture 38% of France's liquid egg market.

Non-thermal, high-pressure pasteurization has labored historically under a "premium-cost" image. The introduction by GEC Alsthom (Nantes, France) of a semi-continuous, horizontal hyperbaric pasteurization system that handles liquid, semi-solid and solid foods and even gable-top cartons and other packages may do much to dispel that.

Last October's E. coli outbreak, associated with Odwalla Co., a Half Moon Bay, Calif.-based processor of natural fruit drinks, was a wake-up call to the premium, natural products industry. The contamination, whatever the source, put at risk an entire natural beverage category that remains horrified at the prospect of heat pasteurization. Heat does not discriminate between vitamins, fresh flavor and microbial pathogens. However, hyperbaric pasteurization does.