Why coffee tastes great with an ISO seal

MANILA, Philippines -  City-based Filipinos may feel like coffee connoisseurs when ordering how they like their favorite brew done by their neighborhood barista. But this does not mean they can actually tell the beans apart.    

Aside from knowing the difference between Arabica and Robusta coffee beans, there is another distinction that coffee lovers may want to know when finding a decent cup of joe: if the company that makes it is ISO 22000-certified.

In this age of melamine and salmonella, food safety makes a whole lot of difference – not just in the taste – but also in ensuring one’s health. And one way to gauge a company’s commitment to safety and quality is its willingness to undergo the toughest certification process in global food safety standards: the ISO 22000:2005 for Food Safety Management Systems.

In the Philippines, only one coffee company has so far received an ISO 22000 certification: Conlins Coffee World, Inc. This almost decade-old family company supplies locally roasted premium coffee beans to the country’s biggest hotel chains, restaurants and cafes, and exclusively distributes quality Swiss-made Jura super-automatic espresso machines, German-made WMF espresso machines, and Italian-made Wega semi-automatic machines.

With Conlins Coffee’s ISO certification, “You can be sure that the product you’re buying was produced in an internationally accepted system that is constantly undergoing rigid improvements,” said Roger Villanueva, Certification Manager of Geneva-based global certification company SGS.

The road to safety

More than a seal, the ISO 22000 certification serves as the concrete proof that a company is willing to put its money where its mouth is. 

 “Getting an ISO 22000 certification was a really long process that took us several months. There was a lot of investment in terms of facilities and training. And from when we started last year until we finished it, the improvements are above and beyond what we expected,” said Michael Harris Conlin, president of Conlins Coffee.

To apply for an ISO 22000, companies will have to establish a food safety management system. “This includes infrastructure, the facilities, machines, the employees, everything,” said Meriam Grace Castillo, SGS Management Systems Auditor.

The rigorous process takes into account all stages in making the product – from how raw materials are acquired to how the final products are distributed. Mechie Madrid, the Food Safety Assistant Team Leader at Conlins Coffee, said the company poured investments in improving everything – “from changing our walls so that dirt cannot accumulate, calibrating all our machines, and even our hand-washing equipment.”

These vast improvements are highly evident in Conlins’ Las Piñas facility, which underwent a major makeover to embody the company’s drive to become a world-class roaster. Another heavy investment is in training employees, as the ISO audit included on-the-spot interviews on workplace practices. This bolstered the morale of people at Conlins Coffee as everyone became “more serious, upbeat, and proud of themselves” for being part of the first coffee roasting company in the Philippines to receive this kind of certification, said Conlin.

Down the supply chain, Conlins also sought for certification from its suppliers to guarantee that they are also following food safety standards. If suppliers are not ISO-certified, Conlins sets internal benchmarks on safety in all aspects.

The ISO 22000 seal also includes two certificates: the Hazard Analysis Critical Control Points (HACCP), a standardized process to prevent health hazards in the food we consume; and Good Manufacturing Practices (GMP), which deals with factors that can impact the quality of the product.

From good to great

Not content with getting the international seal of safety, Conlins Coffee also recently acquired a nitrogen-flushing equipment, a new technology that prolongs the shelf life and ensures the freshness of coffee beans by delaying their aging process. Under normal humidity and temperature, a sealed package that has been nitrogen-flushed will preserve coffee for up to a year.

“This is just the first step in following international standards,” Conlin said.

The local coffee roaster is now more confident of bringing its world-class products to international markets by 2012. “We look forward to continuing the expansion of Conlins in the Philippines then eventually bringing our products to international markets by next year,” he added.

Having a globally recognized standard on food safety, the best gourmet beans, and the newest coffee packing technology available all make Conlins Coffee ready to take on the world – one coffee bean at a time.