METHOD TO TRANSPORT LIQUID MILK

Abstract

The invention is directed to a method to transport liquid milk to obtain transported liquid milk during a supply chain time of more than 10 days wherein during at least a 90% of the duration of the supply chain time the liquid milk is kept at a temperature of less than 2 C. A ship is provided in the supply chain with one or more containers for carrying between 40 and 5000 M.sup.3 liquid milk. Raw milk is subjected to a pasteurization thermal treatment to obtain processed milk for transport by the ship in the supply chain.

Claims

1. Method to transport liquid milk to obtain transported liquid milk during a supply chain time of more than 10 days wherein during at least a 90% of the duration of the supply chain time the liquid milk is kept at a temperature of less than 2 C., wherein the liquid milk is subjected to at least the following means of transport, storage, or both, and wherein the time of transport, storage, or both, is the supply chain time: the transport of a raw milk from a dairy farm to a processing facility by means of a local carrier, transport of a processed milk from the processing facility optionally via a storage facility to a long distancelarge volume carrier, transport from one location to another distant location by means of the long distancelarge volume carrier, transport of the processed milk from the long distancelarge volume carrier to a destination storage facility or directly to a local carrier, storage at the destination storage facility and transport from the destination storage facility or from the long distancelarge volume carrier to a production facility by means of a local carrier, and wherein the large volume carrier is a ship provided with one or more containers for carrying between 40 and 5000 M.sup.3 liquid milk, and wherein at the processing facility the raw milk is subjected to a thermal treatment to obtain the processed milk.

2. The method according to claim 1, wherein the raw milk is subjected to a thermal treatment between 57 and 80 C. at the processing facility to obtain the processed milk.

3. The method according to claim 2, wherein the thermal treatment is a Pasteurisation treatment.

4. The method according to claim 1, wherein the raw milk has a mesophilic bacteria count of less than 50000 cfu/mL.

5. The method according to claim 1, wherein the supply chain time is more than 20 days.

6. The method according to claim 1, wherein the milk has not been subjected to a homogenization treatment.

7. The method according to claim 1, wherein the containers of the large volume carrier are cleaned and sterilised before loading the liquid milk by a process comprising the steps of rinsing the container with water, rinsing with an aqueous solution comprising a soap and contacting the inner surface of the container with a fog of aqueous droplets wherein the droplets comprise an acid liquid sanitizer.

8. The method according to claim 7, wherein the acid liquid sanitizer comprises hydrogen peroxide and peroxyacetic acid.

9. The method according to claim 1, wherein in the container of the large volume carrier a gaseous space is present above the liquid milk comprising of an inert gas.

10. The method according to claim 1, wherein the processed milk is aseptically stored and aseptically transferred between a holding container of the storage facility and the container of the long distancelarge volume carrier.

11. The method according to claim 10, wherein the storage facility stores the processed milk according to the first in-first out method.

12. The method according to claim 10, wherein the milk will be aseptically stored and transported in the container of the long distancelarge volume carrier and aseptically transferred between the container of the long distancelarge volume carrier and a holding container of the destination storage facility.

13. A ship comprising one or more containers each container suited for aseptically carrying between 40 and 5000 M.sup.3 liquid milk, means to cool the containers and liquid milk, means to maintain an inert blanketing above the liquid milk and stirring means or agitators to mix the milk.

14. The ship according to claim 13, wherein the container or containers are built separately and added as such to a ship and wherein the container is not meant to be removed together with its content from the ship.

15. The method of claim 1, performed using the ship according to any one of claims 13-14 as the large volume carrier.

16. The method of claim 2, wherein the raw milk has a mesophilic bacteria count of less than 50000 cfu/mL.

17. The method of claim 3, wherein the raw milk has a mesophilic bacteria count of less than 50000 cfu/mL.

18. The method of claim 11, wherein the milk will be aseptically stored and transported in the container of the long distancelarge volume carrier and aseptically transferred between the container of the long distancelarge volume carrier and a holding container of the destination storage facility.

Description

EXAMPLE

[0043] The following types of milk were stored for 40 days at 0.3 C.0.2 C.: A=raw milk; B=non-homogenized pasteurized milk; C=direct UHT milk; D=non-homogenized thermized milk; E=homogenized pasteurized milk; F=indirect UHT milk. Thermized milk was obtained by a thermal treatment at 62.5 C. for 120 seconds. Pasteurized milk was obtained by a thermal treatment at 76 C. for 20 seconds. UHT milk was obtained by a thermal treatment at 142 C. for 4 seconds.

[0044] A selected number of samples were taken to obtain an indication of the microbiological quality of the milk as part of the shelf life test. The microbiological quality at the start (t=0 days) and the end (t=40 days) of the shelf life test was assessed by a total plate count for mesophilic bacteria. In the below table the total plate count of the different milk variants at the start and the end of the shelf life test and pH value at the end of the shelf life test is provided.

TABLE-US-00001 t = 0 days t = 40 days t = 40 days Milk Code Milk variant (cfu/mL) (cfu/mL) (pH) A raw milk 1.8 * 10.sup.4 2.4 * 10.sup.8 5.98 B non-homogenized 5.2 * 10.sup.3 2.6 * 10.sup.3 6.74 pasteurized milk C direct UHT milk <1.0 * 10.sup.2 <1.0 * 10.sup.2 6.75 D non-homogenized 1.1 * 10.sup.4 3.1 * 10.sup.8 6.14 thermized milk E homogenized <1.0 * 10.sup.2 <1.0 * 10.sup.2 6.74 pasteurized milk F indirect UHT milk <1.0 * 10.sup.2 <1.0 * 10.sup.2 6.70

[0045] The number of total mesophilic bacteria at t=0 days was in all milk variants at an acceptable level (<105/mL). After 40 days of storage at 1 C., only variants A and D (raw and thermized milk, respectively) contained an increased number of mesophilic bacteria. The pH value of these two variants had dropped to 6.0-6.1. It is interesting that for variant B (pasteurized milk) no growth of mesophilic bacteria was observed. This indicates that the population grown in variant A and D was most probably of psychrotrophic origin which were killed during the pasteurization process. This experiment shows that pasteurization is the most suitable heat treatment as regards shelf-life and applicability of the milk.