Policies and Strategies
Production Policy
At Yukiguni Maitake, we make products based on our company motto, “Contribute to society with quality products. A rewarding workplace,” and our code of conduct which states, “We aim to give utmost satisfaction to our customers by providing products with high quality, freshness, and safety that meet their expectations. We do not make anything at all that we do not want to eat by ourselves.”
Our Efforts for Food Safety and Security
Making Products with Confidence
As a food producer, we are complying with HACCP to ensure that our food safety program is well managed. We identify food hazards at every stage of our production process, from receiving raw materials to shipping out finished products, and take necessary steps to prevent these hazards from occurring.
What is HACCP?
HACCP is the abbreviation of Hazard Analysis Critical Control Point and refers to a method of analyzing what constitutes hazards during each manufacturing processes (Hazard Analysis) and defining Critical Control Points along the way to ensure manufacturing safe food products.
To obtain objective evaluation of our HACCP program, we have been driving companywide efforts for the continuous improvement of our food safety management system, including HACCP operations, and acquired certifications from ASIAGAP, an international agricultural standard, and ISO22000, an international food safety standard.
What is ASIAGAP?
This is one part of GAP, or Good Agricultural Practice, which is an international standard originating in Japan. This standard defines requirements not only for food safety, but also for environmental conservation, labor safety, and labor management.
What is ISO22000?
This is an international food safety standard that defines requirements for management systems to be implemented throughout an organization to ensure the application of HACCP principles and procedures.
Safety Measures in Each Production Processes
Raw Materials
Carefully Selected Materials
Our mushrooms are cultivated in a culture medium made from plant-derived materials such as sawdust, which comes from pulverized wood. Since mushrooms absorb nutrients from this medium as they grow, we consider the safety of the medium to be of utmost importance. The sawdust used for cultivation is a 100% domestic product, and is regularly inspected for heavy metals such as arsenic, lead, cadmium and mercury, as well as radioactive substances, to verify its safety.
Cultivation
Hygiene Maintenance
Workers wear specialized work clothes, and wash and disinfect their hands with alcohol thoroughly. In addition, on-site conditions are constantly improved through the monitoring of tools and equipment sanitation, cultivation environment, and microbes in irrigation water.
Contamination Prevention
Workers wear hats that cover their heads to keep hair from falling onto products. Workers entering the production site use an adhesive roller, then pass through air shower to remove any contaminants.
Food Defense
We maintain strict control over entry into the facilities so that no suspicious persons may enter. We also restrict items that are allowed to bring in. In addition, to ensure that the workers are complying with the rules, we conduct image recording of them when they enter the facility and patrol the production site.
Packaging
Inspecting Contaminants in Products
Devices for detecting contamination is installed on the production line and all products are thoroughly inspected for contaminants.
Food Product Safety Inspection
Inspection of agricultural chemicals, heavy metals, and radioactive substances are also conducted on harvested mushrooms for final safety check using the following methods or equipment:
Shipment
Ensuring Traceability
Every single product is marked with a manufacturing code that allows for complete traceability from the manufacturing code to packaging center, packaging line or cultivation center.
We also work with our suppliers and logistics partners to create a system that allows us to swiftly collect products’ location information and quickly respond to inquiries so that customers can track the distribution route from the store where they purchased the product.
Post-shipment Product Management
We make sure our products are refrigerated at a temperature of 10 degrees Celsius or lower for delivery and for storage in distribution warehouses.
Customer
Listening to the Voice of the Customer
At our Customer Service Center, we value communication with our customers, and strive to respond quickly and courteously to any inquiries or requests they have.