The agro-food industrues, a few branches of which have stagnated for many years, are now moving forward on all fronts. The emergence of quality control as an additional and complementary service to production turned out to be an important stage in this evolution. In an increasingly competitive and changing European background, this stage is now being largely outweighed by new criteria of company selections keyed on innovation.

The spirit of innovation has a two-fold aspect :

• emergence in even small companies of R & D departments aiming at creating new products and devising new processes,

• strengthening of the role of "method services" aiming, in a more daily perspective, at improving quality in the company (development of "quality clubs", ...) and at optimizing productivity (reduction of energy consumption, computerization, automization, ...).

Such an evolution demands that managers adapt themselves to any situation, which is more particularly the case in small and medium-sized companies as they constitute the bulk of the food-industry fabric.

Contact

I.U.P. INNOVATION EN INDUSTRIES ALIMENTAIRES
Pôle Universitaire Pierre-Jakez Hélias, Créac'h Gwen 29000 QUIMPER
Phone : 02.98.10.00.60   Fax. 02.98.10.00.01
Manager : Pierre MAFART
Relations with the professionals : Laurent DUFOSSÉ  Laurent.Dufosse@tech-quimper.fr
International relations : Fabienne GUERARD and Denis DE LA BROISE