Disclaimers: For those that in some way ideologically or religiously opposed to eating animals, this post describes business challenges that highlight the difficulties of this industry; personally I believe that the humane treatment of these animals is a moral obligation; the content of this post is about post-mortem processes. For those that are squeamish, this post contains general descriptions of the insides of animals.
The abattoirs I work with typically take an order from the farmer delivering the animal(s) about any special cuts, with the balance going to ground (mutton, lamb, etc). This can probably be best understood as a percentage of the animalsâ live weight. Percentage of âPercent of live animalâ can be a valid UOM conversion in ERPNext. Using a quotation to populate a Sales Order with these percentages seems like a good starting place; maybe using a product bundle as a way to template these things. For example, a customer could specify that they want half of the ground meat turned into sausage, for which thereâs an extra charge. Moving a sales order to a collection of work orders is a surmountable technical/ mapping problem but there are some industry-specific areas of concern.
Accounting in this industry is poorly defined for several reasons:
- One does not typically manufacture many items from a single input item, so there arenât other industries from which to draw convention
- A decision needs to be made if the inventory remains owned by the customer
- The abattoirâs service charge is typically priced based on the deliverable amounts yielded, which are returned to the customer, on a per-weight basis
- Some percentage (35-45% in the US depending on the species) is considered waste and typically not returned to the customer. This includes things like bones, hooves and skin/hide; this is usually called âoffalâ (though sometimes this is specific to the major organs), âbyproductâ or âcoproductâ (when there is meaningful value for some portion of these items, like for sale as pet food in the case of poultry or as liquid fertilizer in the case of pelagic fish)
- This model of manufacturing is very clearly in the âprocess manufacturingâ camp and isnât a great fit for ERPNextâs âdiscreteâ manufacturing model/ perpetual inventory system. Though outbound items are weighed; often a regulatory requirement and the abattoir will often price their services based on these weights. The problem is that the intermediate states of inventory are not typically weighed.
For example:
- In the case of most ungulates, there is a two week or more time that the carcass is hanging in refrigerated and sometimes humidity controlled space, which increases the quality of the meat due to dehydration (less water, more flavor). Because of the dehydration, the weight at the time of hanging and the weight at the time processing the carcass begins are quite different (6-15% loss).
- In the case of processing fish, they are typically immediately placed on ice after they are killed and weighed. Because ice melts there is no way to calculate a tare on the batch, which are never weighed again until individual cuts are packaged. In poultry and fish processing much better automated control hardware exists that can weigh or size cuts is available, often with a tradeoff for traceability at the individual animal level. This hardware is not open source and there is no common interface or an exposed interface or sometimes any digital controls at all and is both adjacent and out of scope of this discussion.
- In many processing paths there will be intermediate states that are stored, especially with larger animals. For example, all sausage making could take place on a certain day of the week. Or âwe break down the heads on Thursdaysâ. In ERPNextâs typical workflow these need to be specific, inventory-able items, especially since there will be a case where the customer retains ownership of the item.
So, back to ERPNext. I donât see a way where it makes sense to develop a generic tool for this industry: there are relatively few of these businesses worldwide (I would guess fewer than 100,000; there are fewer than 500 in the US that are USDA inspected) and each one likely has unique regulatory requirements, which in any food industry is non-negotiable. Back to what I said three years ago making a BOM that âunpacksâ, I think the most reasonable approach for process manufacturing generally is to make stock entries directly. The process manufacturing app takes this approach, as well as other bespoke projects I am aware of.
For non-animal uses cases, I think making a âRepackâ stock entry after receiving items makes the most sense but a âManufactureâ stock entry might also be appropriate. For things that are very firmly in the process manufacturing realm its likely a custom workflow is going to be required anyway.
@adam26d Let me know how I can help, I am happy to do so. @Tropicalrambler likely also has some input about this.
