Sean Riley

Consumer desires and modern lifestyles continue to facilitate a shift in how people perceive food, according to "Trends and Advances in Food Packaging and Processing" from PMMI.

Small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), which make up much of the food industry, have been hesitant to invest in robotics solutions. However, there are many reasons for companies to reconsider.

Expiration dates, packaging conditions, and product look, feel and taste are all considerations in consumer purchase decisions when reaching for meat and poultry.

The demand for easily recyclable material (and machinery that can handle such material) in this sector is expected to continue growing, according to the State of the Industry – U.S. Packaging Machinery Report 2017 from PMMI.

Within the layered approach to brand protection are overt technologies — barcodes, holograms, watermarks, embossing and etching — and covert technologies — taggants, UV, infrared and fluorescent inks, Smart technology and radio frequency identification (RFID).

Technologies incorporated or embedded in the package can convey nutrition information, allergy information, expiration dates and more.

OEMs used VR to demonstrate future projects and give examples of machinery output, replacement part ordering, step-by-step repair instructions and remote monitoring.

As with anything in the food industry, it is the consumer who ultimately drives trends that retailers pass back up the chain to processors.