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CIFT seeks to develop and support projects that address problems or opportunities as defined by the industry. As in the past, the goal of each CIFT project or activity is to achieve one or more of the following.<ul> <LI>To enhance the quality and consistency of value added food products.<LI>To increase the safety of a food processing technique, thereby improving the safety or security of value added food products. <LI>To decrease the costs associated with the production of a value added food product, thereby increasing the economic performance of its producing sector.</ul> CIFT encourages innovation by leveraging funding from private sector and other government sources to underwrite projects that are designed to assess the feasibility of emerging technologies in specific applications, or to perform late stage development and early stage commercialization studies. The CIFT program seeks to supplement major research activities involving its research partners by providing industry involvement in establishing the research agenda, thereby facilitating the eventual industry acceptance of the technologies, techniques, and technical solutions that are being developed.<P> A number of CIFT projects deal with the demonstration of both technical and economic feasibility. These demonstrations assist in the acceptance of technical results by the industry by removing the fear of failure as an impediment to the acceptance of technical innovation. <P>Over the past several years, several areas of common interest have become evident among members of the CIFT industry consortium. Each of these has become a focus area for the CIFT program. <P>We anticipate that significant work will continue in these areas, which include (a) the development of technology that can utilize organic wastes from food processing operations to produce renewable energy, (b) the development of functional foods that produce benefits to human health beyond nutrition, and (c) the development of technologies and techniques that increase product safety and security. <P>We also anticipate that work will continue in several on-going research projects. These include (a) the use of ozone to increase product safety and increase shelf life, (b) the refinement of advanced sensing systems that utilize sophisticated computational techniques such as multivariate analysis, neural networks, and fuzzy logic to develop intelligent process control systems. <P>As was the case last year, the primary categories of research activity for the coming year will be: - New Product Development. - New Process Development and Improvement. - Small Scale Process Development (Small Business Program) - New Technology Commercialization. As always, CIFT will, through its continuing interaction with the food processing industry, develop and complete new projects that reflect both the CIFT objectives and the needs of the industry.
Non-Technical Summary: Many small and medium sized food prcessing companies lack the technical and financial resources to develop and implement new technical solutions. The CIFT program allows these compnaies to evaluate the initial feasibility of technical solutions, stimulating technical innovation. The purpose of this project is to sustain the CIFT program for applied research, which involves more than thirty food industry companies, that range in size from major international processors to small start up organizations. The purpose of the CIFT project is to identify, evaluate, and if feasible, to demonstrate the technical and economic efficacy of new and emerging technologies that addresss a current and relevant industry problem. The key problem ares to be addressed by the CIFT program are food safety, food quality, and food production costs. An integral part of the CIFT program is a proactive technology transfer and commercialization program, which requires that at least one industry partner participate in every project, and that the CIFT Advisory Board, which is comprised of industry representatives from member companies, approve each project undertaken. <P> Approach: A wide range of project areas will be considered. The chief requirement is that the project must have the potential for advancing the technologies used in the processing and/or the packaging of food products. Primary focus will be given to those projects whose end results possess the potential for improving food quality and safety, or for increasing productivity and therefore lowering production costs. The factors favorably affecting evaluation include: 1. A high potential for success in the near term. 2. Broad potential applicability throughout the industry. 3. Financial support from the sponsoring company. All proposals will be evaluated for both industry relevance and technical merit. - Each proposed subcontractor will submit a full academic and professional resume, explaining any and all academic and professional experience with relevance to the project. - Past publications and projects must be detailed, along with the proposed subcontractors rationale for his selection as primary investigator. - A clear statement of research objectives will be provided, demonstrating the researchers understanding of the problem, and the justification for the proposed solution. - Documentation of the novel nature of the potential solution will be provided, eliminating potential redundancy. - Each proposed subcontractor will submit a written explanation of benefits on an industry-wide basis, beyond the participants in the project. - A detailed work plan will accompany each proposal to be evaluated. The plan will enumerate all major tasks to be performed, the goal of each step. And the expected outcomes at each step. - An estimated timetable for the start and completion dates for each task must accompany the work plan. - A plan for preparing interim progress reports to CIFT management must be submitted. - A detailed budget will be prepared and submitted. This document must be consistent with CSREES guidelines, and provide sufficient data to adequately evaluate the potential success of the project.