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This Authorization Agreement is entered into by and between 3-A Sanitary Standards, Inc. and the Applicant.

This guidance document provides a framework for the development of equipment-specific “B Level” 3-A Sanitary Standards or 3-A Accepted Practices and describes the sanitary concepts found in a 3-A Sanitary Standard or Accepted Practice. 3-A Sanitary Standards or 3-A Accepted Practices do not cover machine safety, cost, efficiency, or any other non-sanitary considerations.

This 2024 annual report covers 3-A's operations during 2023.

Request For Interpretation of 3-A Sanitary Standards or 3-A Accepted Practices Criteria

The Report of Alleged Nonconformance (RAN) pertains only to equipment that displays a current 3-A Symbol authorization.  If you believe equipment in use in the dairy and food industry that displays the 3-A Symbol does not conform to a 3-A Sanitary Standard, report such equipment to 3-A Sanitary Standards, Inc. (3-A SSI).  The report must be submitted in writing using this form.

Food Safety is the overarching goal of food production. As such, it must be built into the design and construction of new and remodeled food factories. In order to comply with regulations and ensure that customers will be safe, such design must look at all the aspects of the food supply chain, including warehousing, transportation, preparation, processing and final distribution. This presentation will discuss a practical engineering approach to design food safety into your factory using Process Systems Engineering, and Data-mining techniques to improve safety and overall operational or supply chain efficiencies.

In today’s complex and ever-changing marketplace, uptime in manufacturing can be a make or break for processors, especially when looking at slim margin products.  From the process automation and engineering side, the same slim margins exist along with the ever-shrinking experienced labor pool.  This presentation will cover the basics of making the right choices in vendors, how to ask the right questions and how to cross check that the work that is being completed matches the master scope of work and design criteria and that all of the project documentation is completed to the final ‘as built’ status prior to final closeout.  It is so easy for companies to ‘copy’ and ‘paste’ to save time but does that help or hinder you?

Product Recovery or ‘pigging’ systems have been in use since the early days of US oil exploration. The use of pigs has expanded in the proceeding century to include hygienic process plants. Pigging systems have multiple benefits, both direct and secondary, that touch on CIP systems, waste, yields, product purity, and environmental impact.  With some limitations, the benefits range broadly from cost reduction to revenue increase to lowered environmental impact. Product recovery/pigging systems should be part of every new plant and existing plants should be trying to retrofit to accommodate one.

How does smart hygienic design add up to a positive return on the investment?  This will give you an expert view to quantify your return through water, energy and comprehensive operating cost savings while enabling you to achieve both business and sustainability goals - without tradeoffs.

Hygienic design challenges exist across the food industry and the produce industry is not immune to these challenges. Design challenges begin in the field and continue through the process at the plant. This presentation will focus on the current state of design in the process and how to increase food safety with improvements in design. Discussion will include thinking holistically about design and applying hygienic design principles to equipment, infrastructure and plant layout. With this approach the produce industry has the opportunity to maximize the benefits of hygienic design, resulting in wins in food safety and productivity.