2nd International student competition game
Call for students team registration from Universities
The improvement of practical knowledge and abilities in solving real processing- and food industry-related problems is essential for students in Food Science and Technology and Food related studies in order to meet the current requirements of the professional skills by the job market.
The Erasmus+ European Food-STA project, in collaboration with the ISEKI-Food Association (www.iseki-food.net) and GSICA (http://gsica.net/en/) opens the call for the 2nd international Students competition game with teams from different universities of European and non-European countries that will compete on finding the best solutions on one specific process – and/or food-industry- related problem.
This 2nd edition of the students’ competition will be focused on projects dealing with strategies and actions aimed to the enhancement of the shelf-life of foods. We welcome project proposals dealing with formulation changes, innovative processing, biopreservation, use of innovative packaging, as well as innovations in distribution and logistics.
We are looking for teams of students in Food study programmes that will work on a project focused on the identification, design and development of solutions and ideas relevant for food industry with specific action on improvement and innovation of food processing as well as quality and safety of foods.
WHY:
- each team of students will work on a real food industry-based problem and thereby they will improve specific knowledge and competences
- students will also improve and enhance the cooperation between them and the awareness of the importance and benefits of team working in a competitive environment.
- The evaluation of the project will be carried out by food industry and/or food associations that in collaboration with academics will evaluate the projects based on the best professional abilities in problem-solving and team working
- Virtual environment for sharing knowledge and improvement of skills between students and teachers at European and international level.
WHO: the project is addressed to teams made of Master and PhD students in food science and technology and any other food-related study programme. An academic teacher/lecturer could/would be involved as tutor. See more details in the Instructions box.
AWARDS
Two awards are made available by the two sponsoring organisations for the best two projects/teams:
- Award of 500 Euro for the best project dealing with innovative packaging, distribution and logistics to improve shelf-life, sponsored by GSICA
- Award of 500 Euro for the best project dealing with innovative process and formulation actions to enhance shelf-life, sponsored by the ISEKI-Food Association
CERTIFICATIONS
- Each team and student will receive a letter/certificate of participation to the FoodFactory-4-Us competition game.
- The winner team will receive the corresponding "winners certificate".
COMPLEMENTARY TRAINING
During the project life-time (Feb-April 2018), 3 webinars will be organized dedicated to the registered teams on the following topics
- 27 March 2018 "Making Cheesecake the PM way – A basic introduction to Project Management" (Presenter: Rainer Svacinka, foodintegritystudio, Austria)
- 7 May 2018 "Shelf-life and packaging: what should be take into account to develop innovative high quality foods?" (presenter: Prof. Luciano Piergiovanni, University of Milan, Italy)
- 11 June 2018 "BIOPLASTICS for food packaging: better biobased or biodegradable ?" (presenter: Prof. Luciano Piergiovanni, University of Milan, Italy)
DEADLINES:
- 15th December till 20th January: registration of the teams (to Paola Pittia, ppittia@unite.it)
- 30th January: acceptance of the teams and approval of the projects topics
- 14th May 2018: submission of the project presentation and report
- 7 June 2018: Final presentation of all the projects at the FoodFactory-4-Us- Final Virtual workshop in presence of industry and multiplayer representatives and nomination of the 2 winning teams (Programme can be found at the bottom of the page).
Participation to the Final Virtual Workshop is open, but registration necessary by clicking this link.
REGISTRATION:
On-line, https://www.food-sta.eu/registration-foodfactory4us.
At the registration, teams are required to include: name of the team, team coordinator and members, title of the project and main objectives (max 350 characters); tutor name (if any).
Teams
Teams of students apply on voluntary basis; registration is free of charge. They could be made of 3-to-5 (min-to-max) students, preferentially Master students in Food Studies but for each team max 1 PhD student could be involved. Teams could belong also to universities of associate partners. One tutor (teacher, researcher, post-doc) could be involved (extra member) with the role to support and advise the team; but he/she cannot lead the team work.
Project topic
The teams are invited to present a project aimed to identify solutions, design and develop ideas, tools and actions aimed to solve a real industry-based issue and or an aspect/topic whose results may be of interest for the food industry and/or the food chain.
In this edition, teams and related projects have to be focused on strategies and actions aimed to the enhancement of the shelf-life of foods. Project proposals dealing with formulation changes, innovative processing, biopreservation, use of innovative packaging, as well as innovations in distribution and logistics will be accepted and evaluated.
All the registered teams will work independently on the development of the target issue.
The topic will not compulsory involve practical work in lab and should be focused on finding the best solution that could meet the food companies’ expectations in terms of health and safety risks, improvement of economic value, quality enhancement of the products, sustainability.
A mid-term virtual meeting will be organised with tutors and teams coordinators as check-point and discussion on specific issues.
For the evaluation, the teams will submit by the fixed deadline a report of max 4 pages and a ppt presentation of max 20 slides. A form for the report will be made available to the registered teams. The ppt presentation will be also presented at the final Virtual workshop “FoodFactory-4Us”, an open event and internationally disseminated.
Reports and presentations have to be submitted to Paola Pittia, ppittia@unite.it
Virtual meetings and Final workshop
Virtual meeting
To share information and to discuss about any issue related to the projects and the overall competition the following virtual meeting (via GoToMeeting web-conferencing tool), have been planned:
- 23rd April 2018, 3:00 pm (CET)
Presentations can be found at the bottom of this webpage:
Recording video: a link will be sent to registered persons
Virtual workshop "FoodFactory-4-Us"
The final presentation of the projects by all the teams and appointment of the winners will be carried out in a virtual workshop “FoodFactory-4Us" 7th June 2017, 10:00 AM - 1:00 PM CEST.
Programme of the virtual workshop:
10:00 - 10:20: Opening and welcome by Paola Pittia (FoodFactory-4-Us)
10:20 - 12:40: Project team presentations
12:40 - 13:00: Awards nomination by Gerhard Schleining (IFA) and Luciano Piergiovanni (GSICA)
Closure
Record of the virtual workshop (see below)
Presentations:
- Paola Pittia (Opening)
- Paola Pittia (awards nomination)
Final participating teams:
- Fresh wind of food changes from the Black Sea (I. Larionov, L.Melnyk, V. Hevryk, A. Tropets), Odessa Nat. Academy Food Technol (UA): Application of barrier technologies in extending the shelf life of meat products
- Fat-Caky (Oluwatoyin Onipe, T. Mokhele, M. Sevake), Univ. Venda (SA): Impact of of fibre incorporation and processing conditions on the development of a low-fat, high-fibre snack
- Smart pastry (A. Fateeva, Y. Morhunova, H. Mushachova), Odessa Nat. Academy Food Technol (UA): Use of natural potential of non-typical species of wheat to extend the freshness of pastry
- HealthyCrunchies (A. Onishchuk, V. Holovniak, K. Savenko), Odessa Nat. Academy Food Technol (UA): The natural ways of oxidative rancidity prevention in low-moisture content bakery products
-
FermenteDoc (M. Verni, C. Schiavone, M. Costantini) Università di Bari Aldo Moro (IT): Set up of biotechnological protocols to reduce vegetable waste
- FoodCy (C. Menelaos, A. Zinonas, E. Styliana, A. Kyriakou) Cyprus Univ. of Technology (CY): Strengthening and promoting short food supply chains and local food systems
- Imagineers (O. Pratik, Chunyi Yan, S. S. Jacob, G. Landry) Univ. Lund & Wageningen Univ. & Res.(SE, NL): Innovative Solutions to Extend Shelf Life of Button Mushrooms
Winner teams and projects
GSICA Award:
Imagineers: Innovative solutions to extend shelf life of button mushrooms
Lund University/Wageningen University (SE, NL)
ISEKI Food-Association Award:
Smart Pastry: Use of natural potential of non-typical species of wheat to extend the freshness of pastry
Odessa National Academy of Food Technology (UA)
Scientific organizing team: Florence Dubois-Brissonnet (AGROPARISTECH-FR), Cristina L.M. Silva (Catholic Univ. Portugual-PT) , Gerhard Schleining (IFA-AT & BOKU-AT), Luciano Piergiovanni (GSICA & Univ. Milan-IT, Christophe Cottilon (ACTIA-FR), Paola Pittia (IFA-AT & Univ. Teramo-IT)
For more info about the competition, contact: Paola Pittia (ppittia@unite.it)
