Because food manufacturing is a highly regulated industry, it is imperative that manufacturers reliably manage compliance of their labeling and marketing claims. However, regulatory rules change frequently and differ across various geographical regions. With rules affecting everything from nutrition facts and ingredient lists to product safety information and marketing claims -both on and off the label - it is quite a task to stay compliant. Effective compliance management requires strong analytics and best practices in product knowledge management.

Some common issues are:

• LOCAL RULES - Rules and regulations differ across geographies, making it complicated to ensure compliance for global products.
• CONTINUOUS CHANGE - Rules and regulations are constantly changing, increasing the risk of becoming non-compliant.
• COMPLEXITY - Product elements, such as ingredient properties, formulation, and manufacturing processes, and the corresponding labeling and claims requirements are highly interrelated. Analyzing the impact of the smallest change on regulatory compliance can be very time consuming with always the risk that some element may be missed.
• MANUAL LABEL GENERATION - Labels are often created using desktop tools from information managed in corporate systems, resulting in data transfer processes which are manual, time consuming, and error prone.

Dramatic improvement in compliance management is possible when the following strategies are applied:

1. Establish a central knowledge base to manage all master and local product information along with the associated regulatory requirements.
2. Use advanced analytical tools to evaluate the impact a product change might have on regulatory rules and indicate areas of potential conflicts when new rules are introduced.
3. Integrate label creation technologies with the central knowledge base to ensure efficient and accurate data transfer.

The benefits of taking this approach include:

• IMPROVED PRODUCTIVITY - Centralized knowledge management and sophisticated analytical tools make compliance analysis easier, faster, and more reliable.
• REDUCED RISK - Risks of non-compliance are easily identified allowing speedy resolution to any suspected conflicts.
• FASTER TIME-TO-MARKET - Marketing claims and labeling can be developed in parallel with new product development eliminating the potential of last minute delays.
• INCREASED CREDIBILITY - When labels and claims are compliant, customer and market credibility is enhanced.

Lascom CPG, has been deployed by food manufacturers to substantially improve their compliance management processes. Lascom CPG's advanced knowledge base and sophisticated analytical tools allows leading organizations to maintain compliance faster, easier, and more cost-effectively.