Machines reduce the risk of contamination

Machines don’t cough and sneeze on food. They don’t carry as many germs, and they don’t have hair and skin cells falling from their bodies.

This means that using machines reduces the risk of contamination, which is especially important in the food manufacturing industry.
In 2018, a worker at Kerry Foods in Burton was convicted of planning to contaminate the food production line. Fortunately, this was prevented, but 18 months later, Kerry Foods lost their Tesco contract resulting in 900 job losses.

It was never confirmed whether the two events were linked, but it gets you thinking about just how serious the consequences could be if your food production line was contaminated.

Now we aren’t saying a single hair entering a food product will result in the same level of job losses. But with a global pandemic at the forefront of everyone’s minds, why take the risk that your products could be compromised.

By automating your lines, you could actually be preventing job losses, rather than creating them.

Automation creates jobs

As it stands, machines can’t design, programme or service themselves – those jobs still require humans.
In fact, the more that manufacturers embrace automation, the more jobs there are being created in robotics, engineering, programming, operations, data analysis, systems integrations, servicing and maintenance.

Applications of automated technology

There are examples of how automated technology is being used across almost every industry. Becker alone can provide numerous examples of how our pick and place technology is being used across different sectors.