The technology of food transport has been revolutionized from time to time. Today, people can enjoy the benefits of this technology. For instance, when it is in the dead of winter, consumers can easily find tropical fruits on the supermarket. Also, with the innovations of food transport technology today, it is possible for you to eat asparagus from Argentina, strawberry from Honduras, or apple from New Zealand, simply by buying on the supermarket near your house. For getting more knowledge about technology of food transport, you can take a look at the following information.
Let us start from the history. Until the 19th century, this transport technology was dominated by sea transport. However, during the 1800s, the railway and the steamship revolutionized the continental transport and also food trade. Moreover, during the 20th century, along with the invention of construction of highways and automobile, this technology became more efficient and cheaper.
Moreover, food processing such as freezing, canning, dehydration, and introduction of food preservatives also has advanced food preservation in food transport. However, refrigeration could play important role in the technology of food transport when with fresh foods. Refrigeration is also allowed for the food transport to grow. So, any perishable items can also be kept fresh while in transit. The refrigerated cargo is very important in the freezing food, especially meat.
Furthermore, sea transport is the most common system nowadays. There are so many foods that shipped in the temperature controlled of sea ship containers. These containers commonly come with insulation layers and also refrigerator units that built into them. This food transport system allows the shippers to transport blueberries, avocados, pears, apples, asparagus, and melons from the Pacific East to many markets in the Europe and U.S.
The other technology is called air transport. It is known as the fastest transport method that commonly used for transporting valuable highly perishable items like specialty meats and lobster. However, this method is now used for variety of less perishable vegetables. The transit time of air transport is mostly spent on the tarmac in order to wait for lifting off and docking.
Some industries also use conveyor for transporting foods before packaging. This equipment is very useful to support the packaging process. Instead of food conveyor, there are also other types of conveyor that used in industrial like powered roller conveyor. Some companies prefer to choose used conveyor in order to reduce the production cost.
