A
helping hand from the Industry Capability Network (ICN) has helped a
New Zealand company develop two new product lines which would help
cover the country during an influenza pandemic and one of which it is
now aiming to export.
Wanganui manufacturer
Quality Safety was awarded a substantial Ministry of Health (MoH)
contract to make, supply and store a total of 20 million face masks to
be used by health sector workers in the event of a pandemic.
The Ministry originally
contacted the ICN in September 2005 to assist in identifying which
protective equipment products could be sourced and even manufactured
locally.
The ICN spent several
weeks looking for existing and potential suppliers and evaluating the
options. It was finally decided that the one critical product that
needed to be sourced locally was masks. All the other items were
either available in significant quantities or could be made or adapted
relatively easily by existing suppliers
The search for a mask
manufacturer eventually lead ICN Health and Infrastructure Procurement
Advisor Ian Mallett to contact three Kiwi companies to see if they were
prepared to undertake the significant investment in time and money
required to source machinery capable of producing large quantities of
general purpose and specialist surgical face masks.
Guy Collins, the general
manager of Quality Safety, was eager to secure the contract and worked
hard to meet all the Ministrys requirements which included sourcing
machinery, having a site for manufacture and storage of raw materials,
establishing and managing a stock pile and getting products tested to
the MoH standards.
As a result, the company can now manufacture 26,000 procedure masks and 20,000 P2 respirator masks each day.
”We feel it was really
nice that a company that which has only been going here in New Zealand
for five years was granted this contract, Mr Collins said.
"The Ministry did a
comprehensive study of our company before allowing us this contract and
there was a lot of dotting of is and crossing of the ts before they
were happy. It has also been the first major contract that we have done
for the Ministry and obviously we have worked hard to achieve a high
level of customer satisfaction. It is our impression that we have a
happy customer and that we have built up a lot of credibility for the
next opportunity that we tender on.
Mr Mallett said since
fears of an avian flu pandemic arose, the demand for face masks had
risen dramatically and, for a period of time, they were being imported
by the container load and snapped up.
He said the MoH had
expressed a desire to establish a domestic supply of face masks to meet
demand in the event that New Zealands borders were closed meaning the
masks would be in even greater demand but unable to be delivered.
Mr Mallett searched the
ICNs database of companies starting with ones which produced
industrial filters in the hope of finding a business which could adapt
its manufacturing to produce the masks.
"We went off in all sorts of tangents looking at the possibilities, he said. "It was a fascinating exercise.
A shortlist of several companies was compiled, one of which was Quality Safety.
Mr Collins said Quality
Safety was now working towards exporting the P2 masks which it believed
it could manufacture at an internationally competitive rate.
"Our mask is of a superior fit quality and the raw materials in the masks are of a very high standard for filtration.
BUSY PREPARATIONS: Staff at Quality Safety oversee the production of face masks at its Wanganui factory.
