Legal regime of quality control in goods

It has long been said that market itself is the ideal regulator of all evils that may come up among traders. Free and fair competition among manufacturers in the market will adequately ensure a fair dealing to the consumers. However, these are pious hopes. that markets anywhere in the world could not accomplish so far. Consumers are being sought to be lured by advertisements issued by manufacturers and sellers that are found often false and misleading. Untrue statements and claims about quality and performance of the products virtually deceive them. The plight of the consumers remains as an unheard cry in the wildemess. In this sorry state of affairs, it is quite natural that the consumers look to the governments for a helping hand. It is seen that the governmental endeavours to ensure quality in goods are diversified. Different tools are formulated and put to use, depending upon the requirements necessitated by the facts and circumstances. This thesis is an enquiry into these measures

STUDIES ON THE QUALITY AND PROCESS CONTROL FACTORS DURING THE PRODUCTION AND STORAGE OF SALTED DRIED FISH PRODUCTS

In this study the quality and process control factors during the production and storage of salted dried fish products. The study reveals that quantity of dry fish production in the state is decreasing and dry fish processing industry should be encouraged by central and state governments. The dry and wet salting may be carried out to a period of 4 to 8 hours respectively and time may depend on temperature, size, and concentration of medium. Demand is an unavoidable factor for sale of fish. The packed dry salted lots kept at room temperature are useful only for 20 days. The refrigerator- stored lots had more storage life and nutritional content are good up to 3 months. The cold storage stored dry salted lot had more storage life than the wet salted lot. The use of preservatives in salting is encouraged to reduce pH. The low temperature preservation maintains the nutritional value and quality for long period. It further encourages the labeling of nutritional value of dry fish as in tinned products.

Development of Safety and Quality Management System in Shrimp Farming

Shrimp Aquaculture has provided tremendous opportunity for the economic and social upliftment of rural communities in the coastal areas of our country Over a hundred thousand farmers, of whom about 90% belong to the small and marginal category, are engaged in shrimp farming. Penaeus monodon is the most predominant cultured species in India which is mainly exported to highly sophisticated, quality and safety conscious world markets. Food safety has been of concem to humankind since the dawn of history and the concern about food safety resulted in the evolution of a cost effective, food safety assurance method, the Hazard Analysis Critical Control Point (HACCP). Considering the major contribution of cultured Penaeus monodon to the total shrimp production and the economic losses encountered due to disease outbreak and also because traditional methods of quality control and end point inspection cannot guarantee the safety of our cultured seafood products, it is essential that science based preventive approaches like HACCP and Pre requisite Programmes (PRP) be implemented in our shrimp farming operations. PRP is considered as a support system which provides a solid foundation for HACCP. The safety of postlarvae (PL) supplied for brackish water shrimp farming has also become an issue of concern over the past few years. The quality and safety of hatchery produced seeds have been deteriorating and disease outbreaks have become very common in hatcheries. It is in this context that the necessity for following strict quarantine measures with standards and code of practices becomes significant. Though there were a lot of hue and cry on the need for extending the focus of seafood safety assurance from processing and exporting to the pre-harvest and hatchery rearing phases, an experimental move in this direction has been rare or nil. An integrated management system only can assure the effective control of the quality, hygiene and safety related issues. This study therefore aims at designing a safety and quality management system model for implementation in shrimp farming and hatchery operations by linking the concepts of HACCP and PRP.

Computer vision techniques in seafood quality control

The application of computer vision based quality control has been slowly but steadily gaining importance mainly due to its speed in achieving results and also greatly due to its non- destnictive nature of testing. Besides, in food applications it also does not contribute to contamination. However, computer vision applications in quality control needs the application of an appropriate software for image analysis. Eventhough computer vision based quality control has several advantages, its application has limitations as to the type of work to be done, particularly so in the food industries. Selective applications, however, can be highly advantageous and very accurate.Computer vision based image analysis could be used in morphometric measurements of fish with the same accuracy as the existing conventional method. The method is non-destructive and non-contaminating thus providing anadvantage in seafood processing.The images could be stored in archives and retrieved at anytime to carry out morphometric studies for biologists.Computer vision and subsequent image analysis could be used in measurements of various food products to assess uniformity of size. One product namely cutlet and product ingredients namely coating materials such as bread crumbs and rava were selected for the study. Computer vision based image analysis was used in the measurements of length, width and area of cutlets. Also the width of coating materials like bread crumbs was measured.Computer imaging and subsequent image analysis can be very effectively used in quality evaluations of product ingredients in food processing. Measurement of width of coating materials could establish uniformity of particles or the lack of it. The application of image analysis in bacteriological work was also done

Development of Total Quality Management System in Seafood (Freezing) Industry in Kerala

Quality related problems have become dominant in the seafood processing industry in Kerala. This has resulted in the rejection of seafood sent from India to many destinations. The latest being the total block listing of seafood companies from India from being exported to Europe and partial block listing by the US. The quality systems prevailed in the seafood industry in India were outdated and no longer in use in the developed world. According to EC Directive discussed above all the seafood factories exporting to European countries have to adopt HACCP. Based on this, EIA has now made HACCP system mandatory in all the seafood processing factories in India. This transformation from a traditional product based inspection system to a process control system requires thorough changes in the various stages of production and quality management. This study is conducted by the author with to study the status of the existing infrastructure and quality control system in the seafood industry in Kerala with reference to the recent developments in the quality concepts in international markets and study the drawbacks, if any, of the existing quality management systems in force in the seafood factories in Kerala for introducing the mandatory HACCP concept. To assess the possibilities of introducing Total Quality Management system in the seafood industry in Kerala in order to effectively adopt the HACCP concept. This is also aimed at improving the quality of the products and productivity of the industry by sustaining the world markets in the long run.

A Beacon based Localization System for Autonomous Mobile Robots and its Applications in Traffic and Transport Control

ACCURATE sensing of vehicle position and attitude is still a very challenging problem in many mobile robot applications. The mobile robot vehicle applications must have some means of estimating where they are and in which direction they are heading. Many existing indoor positioning systems are limited in workspace and robustness because they require clear lines-of-sight or do not provide absolute, driftfree measurements.The research work presented in this dissertation provides a new approach to position and attitude sensing system designed specifically to meet the challenges of operation in a realistic, cluttered indoor environment, such as that of an office building, hospital, industrial or warehouse. This is accomplished by an innovative assembly of infrared LED source that restricts the spreading of the light intensity distribution confined to a sheet of light and is encoded with localization and traffic information. This Digital Infrared Sheet of Light Beacon (DISLiB) developed for mobile robot is a high resolution absolute localization system which is simple, fast, accurate and robust, without much of computational burden or significant processing. Most of the available beacon's performance in corridors and narrow passages are not satisfactory, whereas the performance of DISLiB is very encouraging in such situations. This research overcomes most of the inherent limitations of existing systems.The work further examines the odometric localization errors caused by over count readings of an optical encoder based odometric system in a mobile robot due to wheel-slippage and terrain irregularities. A simple and efficient method is investigated and realized using an FPGA for reducing the errors. The detection and correction is based on redundant encoder measurements. The method suggested relies on the fact that the wheel slippage or terrain irregularities cause more count readings from the encoder than what corresponds to the actual distance travelled by the vehicle.The application of encoded Digital Infrared Sheet of Light Beacon (DISLiB) system can be extended to intelligent control of the public transportation system. The system is capable of receiving traffic status input through a GSM (Global System Mobile) modem. The vehicles have infrared receivers and processors capable of decoding the information, and generating the audio and video messages to assist the driver. The thesis further examines the usefulness of the technique to assist the movement of differently-able (blind) persons in indoor or outdoor premises of his residence.The work addressed in this thesis suggests a new way forward in the development of autonomous robotics and guidance systems. However, this work can be easily extended to many other challenging domains, as well.

Cost accountancy and cost control in hospitals

It is a fact that there now exists a sound framework of accounting theory to ascertain the working results and the investment status of hospitals. Yet, there is no system of accounting in practice to conduct its activities with utmost efficiency. No attempts have hitherto been made for the continuous improvement in the servics rendered by hospitals. Personal investments in hospitals have made the interaction of business to some extent.Planning, decision making and control assume increasing importance as hospitals grow in size and complexity. Moreover, wise and effective utilisation of resources should be ensured. The importance of cost cannot be overlooked in this context. Cost is the most effective factor in the determination of the prices of hospital services rendered. The important managerial functions have to rely heavily on accurate and timely cost information. More people can be provided with services if no services cost more than what is a must to provide the necessary level of care. The price paid for high cost technology for a few is no technology at all for the many. Hence no pains must be spared in ascertaining, presenting, controlling and reducing costs. An effective system of Cost Accountancy and Cost Control is imperative for the survival of hospitals in the intensely competitive conditions of today. The valuable objective of "better patient care" can be attained only if the management can make use of the various tools and techniques to ascertain, control and reduce each item of cost in hospitals. Constant efforts must be made by the management to continuously improve their services and bring down costs and prices of all hospital services. Cost Accountancy has made its impresssive impact on almost all the spheres of human activities. It is high time a comprehensive Cost Accountancy and Cost Control system be implemented in hospitals. The problem under study thus is the designing of a sound and full-fledged Cost Accountancy and Cost Control system that suits the requirements of hospitals. It is for the first time in India during the evolution of Cost Accountancy that a comprehensive cost system is tried in hospitals.