Kaizen is a Japanese word meaning ‘good change’. Kaizen for businesses has come to be known as continuous improvement attained by involving everyone in the work environment.

The essence of Kaizen is that continuous improvement is brought by individuals who perform particular tasks, as they are more knowledgeable of that task. Through this method, an organisation shows its confidence in the capabilities of individuals, and induces a sense of ownership over that process among them.

For years, Akshaya Patra has encouraged its employees to adopt Kaizen for continuous improvement in order to achieve excellence in its operations. This is crucial for the organisation as it finds itself highly responsible to ensure optimum utilisation of the resources so that it can realise its goal of feeding millions of children each day. Moreover it is our responsibility to do justice to the trust vested in us by the Central and State Governments along with contributions from all our donors, supporters and well-wishers from India and across the world.

Kaizen is adopted at various levels of operation, through initiatives by the kitchen management. Below are a few examples from last year. These successfully implemented Kaizen Projects were simple yet cost effective, time saving, yielding much better, one way or another.

A Peek into the Kaizen Initiatives at Akshaya Patra during 2013-2014

Price Optimisation in Vegetable Procurement

The Hubli kitchen primarily followed a fixed price contract with an external vendor. One of the limitations of this system was the lack of variety in vegetables and leafy vegetables. As a Kaizen initiative, the purchase team started procuring directly from the State Government-run Agricultural Produce Market Committee (APMC). As a result, Akshaya Patra can now save on costs since the price of vegetables at the local market is much lesser than that quoted by the vendor. This has resulted in saving costs as well as also helped in improving the taste of sambar/curry with varieties of vegetables and greens in it.

Planning route went a long way

Guwahati operations had recorded vehicle distance coverage of 145 km per day that led to 16 litres of petrol consumption each day on distribution of meals to 13 schools. Route analysis, a Kaizen initiative helped reduce the diesel consumption of the vehicle plying one of the routes by 6 litres per day and the distance has been reduced by 50 km. The Kaizen analysis showed that by rotation of the stock of vessels for 13 schools, the distance could be reduced. This has also been a cost saving initiative.

Chick Pea, Pigeon Pea and Split Pea

A combination of pigeon pea (toor dal) and split pea (matar dal) was being used in the preparation of dal. A rise in the market price of pigeon pea resulted in an increase in the cost per meal. After the implementation of Kaizen, the ingredient composition for dal comprised of measured quantities of chick pea, pigeon pea and split pea. This resulted in better taste and nutrition and a favorable feedback from children.

Starch-less cooking

It was found that starch-less cooking implementation could lead to reduced cost involving disposal of starch, enhanced nutritional value of the rice, simultaneously saving significant volumes of water. Skilled labour combined with continuous trial and error efforts made this idea a reality. During the trial and error method it was discovered that maintaining appropriate water levels in cauldrons, maintaining high pressure steam and keeping the lid closed for an appropriate time, are the vital keys in the process. The good feedback from the schools has favoured the implementation. The rice now has enhanced nutritional levels, better taste, reduction in cooking time and cost saving as well.

Vessel Management in the Wash unit

Earlier, it took 4 hours to wash 1800 vessels. The vessels would be unloaded near a washing point and employees would have to manually shift the vessels to the designated washing bay resulting in hectic movement and wastage of time. Now, as a Kaizen initiative, coupons are being issued to the vehicles carrying vessels. Based on the coupon number, the corresponding vehicles unload vessels near the washing point. This has not only helped to reduce the effort needed to shift the vessels but has also reduced the vessel washing cycle time from 4 hours to 3 hours. The cascading effect has also been on reduced electricity usage and reduced water.

Quality Food is everything at our kitchen

As a part of the ISO 22000:2005 surveillance audit and with a commitment to ensure periodic verification, samples are drawn and analysed in a National Accreditation Board for Testing and Calibration Laboratories NABL accredited laboratory. Samples of cooked food, swabs of equipment, personal hygiene of employees, chlorinated vegetables and raw materials are sent to the laboratories for checking compliance level and effectiveness of the food safety practices being followed. After the implementation of Kaizen, the Bangalore kitchen at H K Hill additionally gets food samples from the school analysed at periodic intervals for microbiological parameters. Sample of food from select schools which receive the food cooked in the first batch are sent for testing. The reports help to give a better understanding of the shelf-life of cooked products after several hours of production and transport.

With each of these and more such initiatives by the employees, Akshaya Patra aims at holistic development of its operations. Individual and team efforts along with continuous improvement initiatives at every level will aid toward optimum utilisation of resources, leading to increased capacity of the organisation in reaching more and more children.

The Akshaya Patra Organisation is providing mid-day meals to over 1.3 million children every day. But how do you know that you can trust the quality of the food being served? The Akshaya Patra Foundation bares all to lay your doubts to rest. Here’s an in-depth accounting of every step, process and precaution put in place to ensure that nothing but healthy, wholesome and hygienic food passes our doors.

Akshaya Patra follows a carefully prescribed food safety plan whilst handling, preparing and storing food, to make sure that no child gets sick because of foodborne illnesses. As a recipient of the Det Norske Veritas Food Safety System Certificate, The Akshaya Patra Foundation is ISO 22000:2005 compliant across eleven kitchens. Akshaya Patra has aimed to uphold the ISO 22000 standard for several reasons: to have a food safety management system in place that ensures that all food being cooked is safe; to demonstrate compliance with food safety regulations; to evaluate customer requirements and satisfaction; to effectively communicate food safety issues to suppliers, customers and other relevant parties and to attain certification of the food safety management system from an external organisation.

The key to healthy food is to have a clean and hygienic cooking environment. The Akshaya Patra kitchens are 5S (sort, simplify, scrub, standardise and sustain) and GMP (good manufacturing processes) compliant, checked with regular audits. The kitchen infrastructure includes all stainless steel 304 grade cooking equipment. The staff follows extremely high standards of personal hygiene from wearing hair caps, face masks, clean uniforms, gloves, gumboots to following stringent hand disinfection.

The vegetables are carefully sifted through to remove any spoiled or damaged ones, cleaned with potable water and sanitised in chlorine water before cutting to reduce the risk of any microbial contamination. Beyond this, the raw material for cooking is accepted only after a thorough quality inspection and the rice is cleaned mechanically and then washed completely.

Safety is of utmost concern even during the cooking process. Cauldrons, trolleys, rice chutes, sambar or dal tanks, cutting boards and knives etc., are sanitised with steam just before use. The kitchens follow a policy of a hundred percent adherence to the recipe and the cooking is executed under the watchful eyes of trained cooks and production supervisors. To reduce any margin for error, other measures like periodic checks on cooking temperatures and batch wise quality checks on the food by quality officers are also undertaken. Once the food is cooked it is packed into steam sterilized vessels. All the food contact surfaces are of either 304 grade stainless steel or food grade plastic.

High quality standards are followed while delivering food to the schools as well. The body of the vehicles is insulated with thermocol to retain the heat inside. The vehicles are water washed with a pressure jet on the previous day, while the cleanliness of the vehicle is again checked before loading the food inside. Stainless steel racks meant for vessels of small, medium and big sizes are laid inside to secure the vessels and prevent spillage. The temperature of the food is checked once more during delivery as well.

Completing the cycle of quality food delivery, all the schools are equipped with a do’s and don’ts list. A daily feedback mechanism is established and responded to in 24 hours, customer complaints are managed within 24 hours and customer satisfaction surveys are conducted to improve the products and services.

At The Akshaya Patra Foundation, we don’t merely want to provide a meal; we want to provide health, hope and above all, happiness to the millions of children in need of it. And we are committed to doing it in a safe and sustainable manner, which will survive the challenges of the future.