Working from home; does that work for large fresh produce companies?
"Your question comes at a good time. I just came in - had just worked from home - with a few people here to evaluate how the test is going, which we have been doing since 6 o'clock this morning, with a large number of employees working from home," says Jos Caubo, Manager Communications & PR from ZON. "That means, by the way: the office workers. Logistic employees cannot prepare orders at home of course, so they continue working here."
"We are doing this test to be able to eliminate any problems with logging in or anything else that can be resolved in advance so that in the event that we may be forced to work from home, everything will run smoothly," Jos continues. "For the time being, sales continues as normal. “At all those who are normally physically present to buy at the auction clock, we installed the app so they can purchase from home.” If the logistics center should also be closed, we will look to deliver as much as possible directly from the fields, but that is of course more problematic with orders for several products at the same time."
"We already assembled a Corona Prevention Team in last week, which brings us together twice a week to discuss all new developments and where necessary, to take measures as described above," Jos concludes.
"Here in Belgium, companies are recommended to allow and accommodate people to work from home. This is technically possible for people who work in our office, but this is more difficult in operations, "says Dennis Duinslaeger of Greenyard Group. "We have therefore also developed plans and measures that repeat the general precautions, but also goes a little further for our specific activities. For example, how to handle lorries coming from higher risk areas with caution; estimate blockages for transport at border crossings; sudden increased demand in preserved and frozen products, etc."
"In addition, it is generally not recommended to go to places where many people are together. Business trips and fairs are all canceled," Dennis continues. "On the other hand, it is true that fruit and vegetables continues to be an important source of nutrition and vitamins, and it is important that these companies continue to operate. So we will continue to focus on this to ensure continuity of supply in the coming weeks! "