Trends in Information Technology Influencing Food Industries

Food Technology is a science branch that deals with the techniques involved in production, processing, preservation, packaging, labelling, quality management, and distribution of food products. The field also involves techniques and processes that are used to transform raw materials into food. Extensive research goes behind making food items edible as well as nutritious. Food processing is one of the largest manufacturing industries in the world. There are more than 1.2 million retail food facilities (restaurants, grocery stores, and others) that serve or sell foods directly to consumers. The food processing industries are involved in processes such as primary and secondary processing, preservation, quality management, packaging and labelling of a variety of products such as dairy products, fish products, fruit and vegetable products, meat and poultry products, confectionery products and food grains. The food technology is to develop new methods and systems for keeping food products safe and resistant from natural harms such as bacteria and other micro-organisms. Food processing helps in preservation enhances the flavour and reduces the toxins in the food product which results in better distributional efficiency and easy marketing of the food product. This book contains 10 Chapters each focusing on the automation of Food Engineering, Food Processing, Food Packaging and labeling and Logistics. This book will guide the Food technologists to explore automation using computers and software. technologies.