1)About the Production Season

In the process of daily quotation, usually some customer will require the “most fresh raw materials” especially for canned food.

Some of them even ask for the raw materials from this month.

But to some products under certain production season, it is very hard to realize the customers requirement.

Here let me introduce the idea of production season for canned food.

Production season normally means the season of the raw material harvest season.

For those common fruits we usually do like Canned Yellow peach, Canned Lychees, Canned beans and Canned sweet corn products, they all have harvest seasons.

In the harvest season, the factories will buy the raw materials and make the goods under the previous orders or the orders already set.

When the raw material price is very low, the factory will stock more materials and produce the goods in advance and sell them in future orders.

Here the following, please find the production season of canned fruits.

	JAN	FEB	MAR	APR	MAY	JUNE	JULY	AUG	SEP	OCT	NOV	DEC
APPLE	Yes	Yes	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	Yes
STRAWBERRY	No	No	YES	YES	YES	No	No	No	No	No	No	No
APRICOT	No	No	No	No	No	YES	No	No	No	No	No	No
CHERRY	No	No	No	No	No	YES	No	No	No	No	No	No
PEACH	No	No	No	No	No	No	YES	YES	YES	YES	No	No
MANDARIN	YES	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	YES	YES	YES
PEAR	YES	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	YES	YES	YES
FRUIT COCKTAIL	YES	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	YES	YES
PINEAPPLE	YES	YES	YES	YES	No	No	No	YES	YES	YES	YES	YES
MUSHROOM	YES	YES	YES	YES	YES	YES	No	No	YES	YES	YES	YES
SWEET CORN	No	No	No	YES	YES	No	YES	YES	No	YES	YES	No
GOLDEN CHANTERELLE	No	No	No	YES	YES	No	YES	YES	No	YES	YES	No
STRAW MUSHROOM	No	No	No	YES	YES	No	YES	YES	No	YES	YES	No
SHIITAKE	YES	YES	YES	YES	YES	No	No	No	YES	YES	YES	YES
OYSTER MUSHROOM	YES	YES	YES	YES	YES	No	No	No	YES	YES	YES	YES
NAMEKO MUSHROOM	YES	YES	YES	YES	YES	No	No	No	YES	YES	YES	YES
SUILLUS MUSHROOM	No	No	No	No	No	YES	YES	YES	No	No	No	No
BAMBOO	No	No	No	No	No	No	YES	YES	YES	YES	No	No
LYCHEES	No	No	No	No	No	YES	YES	No	No	No	No	No
WATER CHESTNUTS	YES	YES	YES	YES	YES	No	No	No	No	No	YES	YES
BABY CORN	No	No	No	YES	YES	YES	No	No	YES	YES	No	No
CHERRY TOMATO	YES	YES	YES	YES	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	YES
RED/GREEN PAPPER	YES	YES	YES	YES	No	No	No	No	No	No	No	YES
CUT GREEN PEAS	No	No	No	No	YES	YES	No	No	YES	YES	No	No
ASPARAGUS	NO	NO	NO	YES	YES	YES	YES	YES	YES	YES	YES	NO

2）2）Production Date and Packing Date

Take the canned yellow peach order made in January as an example, shown from above sheet, the real production time should be January to September of last year.

However, the production date printed on the tins can be January as required.

Therefore, the factory should be very experienced during the production season when they need to decide how many raw materials to be prepared and how many canned food under different size will be produced.

They also need to do quite a lot of investment on preparing the raw material, and if they are not able to finish the stocks in time, the factories will lose a lot.

For some canned foods with production seasons, sometimes the price on the market are quite different and confusing too.

The factories wish to sell the products made in new production season with a comparative high price while other factories

who hold the stocks from previous years with declined product quality will sell them in lower price expecting to clear their stocks.

In the real transaction of the business, if the production date is less than one year, you can tell your customers it is newly made or fresh.

If the stocks are over one year, you should tell your customers it is old stocks and of course the price will go much lower.

The following are the photos of the inside tin which are affected by longtime preservation.

Picture one is the lacquered inner tin of canned yellow peach who is corroded by the long term preservation fell part of the lacquer.

Picture two is Canned pineapple in syrup made in 2011 while I opened it in 2018. It's non-lacquered inner tin turned a bit black while the flavor of the pineapple was good as usual.

Picture three is canned broad bean made in 2017 while I opened it in 2011. Both the soup and quality of the beans were good of others.

3）2)About the regulation of Shelf life of Canned foods

We will confirm about the expiring date with our customers in each order.

Normally for canned food, the shelf life is two or three years and some customers may require 18 months. Some other products like wines,

the factory should firstly apply for a record in local government before printing the expiring date.

There is no clear regulation of shelf life for canned food in the production standard in China.

From our practical experience and lots of cases, all kinds of food can be preserved over two years if the cans are strictly sealed and sterilized.

There is one specified time written in the previous China Light Industry General Committee, shown as follows:

In 1995, the previous China light industry General Committee has made an announcement under light general food products paper work（1995） number 22

“ The notification of the Expiration date on exported canned food” , which specified the expiration date of canned food to be：

Two years for the canned seafood in tomato sauce, Juices, Tomato products, fruit and vegetable products and other canned foods.

3 years for Canned pork, beef, mutton, poultry, Fried oil, food and Fruit jam.

Meanwhile, it is specified that " If the imported government has other requiring towards the canned foods expiring date and if they are over our limited time,

products can be marked under the regulation of the import country. However, the regulation of quality discrepancy and claim for compensation should be issued under our regulation."

In 1991, No.9 Light industry（1991）issued by The previous national light industry department " noted about printing the marks on professional food label for 10 kinds of food stuffs such as canned food and beverage",

the rules of the preservation time for canned food selling inland China is:

Fish, meat, poultry be over 24 months; Fruit and vegetable be over 15 months.

According to the implementation of the shelf life of canned food stipulated by the relevant departments of the country over the years and the results of the storage test of soft canned products by some manufacturers, the China Canned Food Industry Association issued a document to stipulate the shelf life of canned food:

1. Shelf life of hard-packed cans: no less than 24 months for canned meat, poultry, and fish produced in metal cans and glass cans (bottles); no less than 15 months for canned fruits and vegetables, and canned wheat and pasta; Canned fried dried fruit, fruit and vegetable juice, shrimp, crab, shellfish, and tomato products for not less than 12 months.

2. Shelf life of high-barrier flexible packaged food (soft can): the shelf life of various soft cans produced using high-barrier composite materials, including aluminum-plastic composite bags, plastic composite bags, paper-plastic-aluminum composite containers, plastic cups, and plastic bottles, shall not be shorter than 12 months.

Fried dried fruit, fruit juice, shrimp, crab, tomato sauce not less than 12 months old.