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Quality and inspection

What to test, and where.

An inspector can count, measure and compare against a sample. Anything chemical, microbiological or compositional needs a laboratory. The decision that matters is whether the test happens in Indonesia, while the goods can still be rejected cheaply, or at destination after you have paid the freight.

What actually needs a laboratory.

The properties below cannot be judged by eye, and every one of them has stopped Indonesian containers.

Mould toxins
On nuts, spices, dried fruit and cereals. The recurring rejection reason across Indonesian agriculture, caused by drying and storage in a humid climate.
Pesticide and antibiotic residues
On agricultural produce and on farmed seafood. Decided on the farm or in the pond months before anybody saw the goods.
Histamine
On tuna, anchovy and related species. Formed when fish warm after capture, survives cooking, and cannot be removed.
Heavy metals
On leaf products, ceramics with glazes and some botanicals. A soil and a materials question.
Microbiology
On spices, dried goods and anything processed. Steam treatment is the usual control and it belongs in the specification.
Composition
Patchouli alcohol, eugenol, coumarin, iodine number, protein. Whatever the contract price actually turns on.
Species identification
Where substitution is the risk rather than quality: fish maw, nutmeg, eel, timber. A different test from composition.

Origin or destination.

Testing at origin means a failed lot never ships. You have paid for a test rather than for a container of unusable goods plus freight plus disposal, and the producer can still fix or replace it. This is almost always the better economics.

Testing at destination means results your own authority is more likely to accept without question, and it means you already own the problem. For products where your market requires its own testing anyway, some duplication is unavoidable.

The common arrangement is testing at origin against your specification, with the destination testing whatever the regulator requires. Where the two use different methods, expect different numbers and agree in advance which governs.

Getting a result you can rely on.

Name the laboratory or the accreditation requirement in the specification rather than accepting whoever the producer uses. Name the method. Have the sample taken by somebody with no stake in the result, which on a container of bulk goods is the whole ballgame.

Keep a sealed retained portion of the tested sample. If a dispute arises, the retained sample is what a second laboratory analyses, and without one the disagreement has no way to resolve.

Questions buyers ask.

Is testing every lot excessive?

On anything where a contaminant limit decides acceptance, no. The first container from a new supplier is usually excellent and drift is what catches people out months later. Per-lot testing on the properties that matter is how food manufacturers avoid discovering a problem in production.

Can I rely on the producer's own laboratory?

For routine monitoring, often. For the number that decides acceptance or price, it has an obvious interest and independence is worth the modest cost. A good producer will not object, and objection itself is information.

What if origin and destination results disagree?

Usually the method, the sample or the time between them, in that order of likelihood. This is exactly why the specification should name the method and why a sealed retained sample exists. Without those, the disagreement cannot be resolved and becomes a negotiation.

Read next.

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