A Comparative Study of Defect Analysis, Statistical Process Control (SPC) and FMEA in Biscuits Production

Resumo

The bakery business has made it one of its ongoing challenges to ensure that the product quality remains the highest despite the various defects such as over burning, under burning, and product breakages. Whereas Statistical Process Control (SPC) and Failure Modes and Effects Analysis (FMEA) work well in other industries, their total application in the production sector in the bakery sector is a gap (especially in defect management and quality maximization). This paper is aimed at bridging this gap by applying the SPC and FMEA on four various bakery items, including Coconut Burnies, Jira Burnies, Twin Toast, and Ghee Toast. The objective is to define the most recurrent defects, investigate their causes, and recommend the means to restructure them to enhance output productivity. Using SPC, defect rates were monitored throughout the process, and FMEA was utilized to identify the area that the production process could fail. The results indicate that SPC and FMEA may play a significant role in a production process to minimize flaws and enhance the quality of a product. Comprising of actionable insights, this paper can help product producers in the baking sector to enhance the effectiveness of the operations and the homogeneity of the products.