Ergonomically Correct CC Container Plastic Shelves Save Money and CO2
29th March 2011
Following the RFID implementation on the CC Container, an increasing number of users are scanning and any containers that do not have the genuine CC RFID tag are rejected. The improved pool protection now paves the way for further development of the CC Container to the benefit of all users.
CC Container Shelv
es in Focus
As Container Centralen (CC) has already promised, they will further improve the CC Container now that the pool is closed. One of the focus points is the shelves.
“Unfortunately, the quality of the shelves in the system today is very inconsistent due to a huge influx of illegal low-quality shelves,” says Tonny Vangsgaard Gravesen, CEO at CC, and he continues, – “To improve the overall quality, we need to close the pool to the illegal influx. One idea has been to RFID tag the existing plywood shelves. It would, of course, make more sense to convert to plastic shelves to save the hassle of tagging the old shelves, but we also need to consider how to finance such a conversion. However, we cannot neglect the benefits that the lighter shelf will have for the industry.”
The idea of RFID tagging the existing plywood shelves has been put on hold by CC, and they have now developed a new durable and light-weight plastic shelf instead.
New Plastic Shelves in Test Flows from April
- “CC has been working on the development of new plastic shelves for some years now, and from April several hundred shelves will be tested in real life flows in The Netherlands, Germany, Italy and Denmark, involving users in all parts of the supply chain. After the peak season, experiences and ideas to improve the plastic shelves further will be collected and used in the final design,” Gravesen explains.
Søren Bech, owner of the Filippa plant nursery in Denmark, expects a lot from the plastic shelves. ” We are looking forward to taking part in this trial and being able to suggest possible adjustments in the design,” Bech says. He continues, “The fact that the weight of a plastic shelf is only half that of the current plywood shelves is a huge improvement in itself – not least for our many female employees who handle the shelves every day.”
The shelves from CC are pure plastic to ensure that they are light and easy to handle, unlike other plastic shelves in the market today which all have iron reinforcements and are much heavier. Thus, apart from a better and more consistent quality, the CC Container users will have less weight to handle.
200 million tkm* less per year
"There are more than 14 million CC Container shelves in the market today, and each shelf will become approx. 3 kg lighter, so there will be a huge reduction in the total weight handled and transported in Europe," says Gravesen, and he continues, - "If we estimate that each container does 8 „round trips‟ per year, the workers in our industry will lift approx. 336,000 tons less per year! This improves ergonomics significantly.”
In addition to improving ergonomics for the workers who handle the CC Container shelves, the lighter weight also means savings on fuel in the industry – which in turn leads to reduced CO2 emissions.
“If we add to the calculation that a CC Container on an average is transported 600 km per round trip – from grower to auction to wholesaler to retailer and back to the grower again – this will lead to a reduction in CO2 emissions corresponding to more than 200 million tkm* per year. Another significant improvement," says Gravesen.
“It is, of course, nothing new that you can create a plastic shelf. However, we focus on the real-life use, the long lifetime, the design, and not least the weight of the shelves. It is not enough to be present at exhibitions with a nice looking prototype and glossy paper. We need to be sure that it works for the users,” Gravesen concludes.
* tkm = ton-kilometre = moving one ton of cargo one kilometre
More information:
Tonny Vangsgaard Gravesen, CEO, Container Centralen A/S, tel.: +45 65 91 00 02 www.container-centralen.com
Legal action taken as fake Container Centralen - CC Padlocks traced
8th March 2011.
As of Thursday, February 24, several flows with fake padlocks have been detected. The fake padlocks are visual look-alikes to the "Operation Chip It" padlocks. They are red plastic padlocks without an RFID chip, and they were immediately found in the scanning processes at FloraHolland and Landgard.
The introduction of RFID on CC Containers has had a good start with very limited operational issues surfacing to date. Broad support now exists in the sector for this effort to improve the quality and management of the pool and in the period leading up to January 10, 2011, the pool has been expanded by more than two hundred thousand containers. In addition to the partners in the project, FloraHolland, Landgard, GASA Group, VGB and Container Centralen, a growing number of companies in all parts of the industry now only accept CC Containers with the RFID padlock.
“Unfortunately, but not unexpectedly, there are parties in the horticultural sector that seek to make fraudulent use of the system, at the expense of the thousands of committed users,” says Tonny Vangsgaard Gravesen, CEO of Container Centralen. “However, these recent occurrences prove that the control system based on the RFID scanning works. The containers handed in were immediately recognised as fake and an investigation backwards in the supply chain was started.” Investigations have established that these fake padlocks originate from one manufacturing source and the flow of containers has been traced back with the support of committed users. Operational and legal action is being taken towards parties that take part in the fraudulent use of the system by introducing fake padlocks.
In the south of The Netherlands concrete actions actually have been taken against a few companies. Equipment has been confiscated and the incident has been reported to the police.
“Although there are a handful of visual indications upon close inspection, the fake padlocks look like the genuine padlocks in the regular operations. The only way to effectively detect that they are not genuine is by scanning them. Container Centralen’s primary role is to secure a well-functioning high-quality pool system. Every committed user can play his or her part in ensuring the pool system: we strongly recommend that everyone scans the containers they receive,” concludes Gravesen.
Gravesen urges everyone to be vigilant and to report any suspicious flow or activity to the nearest CC office or to one of the partners: FloraHolland, GASA Group, Landgard or VGB. Supportive users are a key to identifying flows and eliminate fraudulent use of the system.
Secure Your Business in the Peak Season
The peak season is now rapidly approaching and the demand for and volume of containers travelling from producers to auctions / traders and retailers throughout Europe will increase substantially in the coming weeks. To avoid unnecessary and costly interruptions to the flows, all CC Container users are encouraged to ensure that they get their CC Containers from a reliable source, e.g. one of the partners or a CC depot.
As announced, until March 11th, CC offers users a reduced license fee of €10 to bring any remaining non-labelled containers into the system to ensure they have sufficient containers available to do their business.
Design of CC Container RFID Tag Released
During the past months, there has been a lot of talk and writing about the new ID tag with built-in RFID (‘electronic labelling’) for the CC Containers. Now the design of the tag has been released by Container Centralen (CC). All CC Containers must have this new tag and the CC metal plate to be accepted in the CC Pool System from January 10, 2011.
The CC RFID tag has a unique security, meaning that the RFID code is impossible to copy,’ says Tonny Gravesen, CEO at CC. Tonny Gravesen continues,‘- RFID is the best way of protecting the pool of CC Containers against fraud – and actually the only efficient way that we have been able to find so far.’
With the increased protection of the CC Container pool, fake low-quality containers will be kept out in future, which will mean lower costs for repair and maintenance as well as the elimination of free riders in the system. CC have committed themselves to pass on all cost savings to the customers. Thus,there will be no pool fee price increase in 2011, and it will even be reduced by at least € 0.50 in 2012 and another € 0.50 in 2013. 3.5 million RFID tags are a lot, and CC have therefore contracted an external partner to pack and ship the tags. About 20,000 companies have CC Containers under contract and they will receive the quantity of tags corresponding to the quantity stated in their contracts before January 10.
[FACT BOX]
The RFID implementation on the CC Containers is supported by FloraHolland, VGB, Landgard, GASA
Group and CC. The five partners in this project have recently summed up the most important facts and
status of the project in nine simple bullet points:
1. From the 10th of January 2011, FloraHolland, GASA Group, Landgard and CC will scan all ingoing
Containers.
2. From the 10th of January 2011, FloraHolland, GASA Group, Landgard and CC will only hand out
genuine CC Containers.
3. In December 2010 / January 2011 customers will receive new ID tags (‘padlocks’) according to the
number of CC Containers they have under contract with CC. CC will credit the customers € 0.20 per
CC Container for the tagging.
Container Centralen, 6 December 2010
4. If the customer has more CC Containers than stated in his contract(s) with CC, he can currently add
these to his CC contracts at a special license fee of only € 6 per CC Container. After the 10th of
January 2011, the license fee will be € 18.
5. All containers without the new CC ID tag and the CC metal plate will be rejected.
6. New ID tags that cannot be scanned or give an error message will, in the first instance, also be
accepted and included in the customer’s balance. The containers will, however, be recorded
Separately.
7. A special Control Group, manned with both CC and external experts, will investigate and report any
suspicious flows or patterns. This is necessary in order to find and eliminate misuse of the shared
System.
8. If the situation demands it, customers with suspicious flows or patterns will be asked to improve
control before hand-in so that any misuse can be avoided.
9. Containers without a genuine CC RFID tag are not accepted in the CC Pool System. Therefore, CC
recommend that you always scan the containers you receive.