Aiming for higher heights
Two women are on a mission to grow their company.
Iyalago Food Assurance Consultants (IFAC) was established in April 2017 and aims to assist food establishments in Namibia to implement and manage food safety and quality management systems.
The two iron ladies behind IFAC each have over 13 years’ experience in the fishing industry. Vera Iiyambo and Ruth Martinez-Lago established the company after they faced being retrenched at the company they worked for.
“We discussed starting our own business and after we were told that it’s best that we find other jobs, we sprang into action. IFAC was born and before we received our retrenchment letters, IFAC was already up and running.”
Martinez-Lago and Iiyambo both hold Bachelor of Science degrees in fisheries and aquatic sciences from the University of Namibia.
Prior to co-founding IFAC, Martinez-Lago began her career at Westhook Fish Processors as a quality controller. She then joined the Namibian Standards Institution (NSI) at the fisheries inspectorate as a food inspector and then later as a senior food inspector.
It was with NSI that she acquired the knowledge of food industry regulations and standards as well as their interpretations.
She joined United Fishing Enterprises as a quality manager and gained experience at senior management level and successfully steered the organization to FSSC 22000 certification as a food safety leader.
She also successfully handled some of IFAC’s biggest projects in Morocco, Thailand and Argentina where she assisted processing facilities with new product development through process optimization and the production process. She also designed their product specifications and correlated standard operation procedures.
Iiyambo worked at sea for Namsov Fishing Enterprises before joining NovaNam in Lüderitz where she spent three years as a quality system administrator. She then transferred to Deep Ocean Processors in Walvis Bay as head of the quality department and within a year, she took on the responsibility of quality manager.
After leaving NovaNam, Iiyambo went to work for United Fishing Enterprises as quality assurance coordinator and honed her practical skills in leading organizations in implementing and maintaining both IFS and FSSC 22000 food safety certifications.
Her expertise lies in product sampling and testing, hygiene audits, design of documentation and improving food safety systems and statistical analysis.
“It wasn’t easy to get where we are now, and we are still improving on our services, our business. Although we started in 2017, we only started paying ourselves salaries towards the end of 2018. We worked from home and only moved into our offices last year,” she says.
It is evident that both ladies started from the bottom and worked themselves up the corporate ladder.
“Many people have this notion that when you have your degree, you are supposed to walk into a middle management position at a company. That doesn’t happen. Starting from the bottom taught us so much more than any university ever could.”
Both say their main goal for their business is growth.
“This will enable us to transfer our knowledge, which is one of our main goals. What you learn in university isn’t always applicable to reality, and we want to close that gap for graduates entering the job market,” the dynamic duo say.
They also have plans to embark on a nationwide food safety campaign.
“There are campaigns with the same goal, but we feel it needs to be done on a larger scale. Our people don’t realize the importance of food safety.”
They currently provide services to the fishing, hospitality and poultry industries and are also hoping to expand to other industries.
IFAC offers a variety of services, which include awareness training on food safety, FSSC 22000, ISO 22000 training, basic hygiene and cleaning techniques, food safety and quality assurance training, food allergen control management training, food fraud training and onsite food handler’s training for hotel, kitchen, restaurant and catering staff.
They also offer product or facility inspection, GFSI benchmarked schemes’ implementation and audit prep as well as HACCP implementation and audit prep.
IFAC offers pre-inspection of facilities, product label evaluation, assistance with sampling, sourcing of testing laboratories, canned fish inspection, frozen fish inspections, food safety, quality and hygiene investigations as well as preparation of vessels for regulatory authority inspection.
The company also offers technical assistance in research and development of canned fishery product and other value-added products.
The two iron ladies behind IFAC each have over 13 years’ experience in the fishing industry. Vera Iiyambo and Ruth Martinez-Lago established the company after they faced being retrenched at the company they worked for.
“We discussed starting our own business and after we were told that it’s best that we find other jobs, we sprang into action. IFAC was born and before we received our retrenchment letters, IFAC was already up and running.”
Martinez-Lago and Iiyambo both hold Bachelor of Science degrees in fisheries and aquatic sciences from the University of Namibia.
Prior to co-founding IFAC, Martinez-Lago began her career at Westhook Fish Processors as a quality controller. She then joined the Namibian Standards Institution (NSI) at the fisheries inspectorate as a food inspector and then later as a senior food inspector.
It was with NSI that she acquired the knowledge of food industry regulations and standards as well as their interpretations.
She joined United Fishing Enterprises as a quality manager and gained experience at senior management level and successfully steered the organization to FSSC 22000 certification as a food safety leader.
She also successfully handled some of IFAC’s biggest projects in Morocco, Thailand and Argentina where she assisted processing facilities with new product development through process optimization and the production process. She also designed their product specifications and correlated standard operation procedures.
Iiyambo worked at sea for Namsov Fishing Enterprises before joining NovaNam in Lüderitz where she spent three years as a quality system administrator. She then transferred to Deep Ocean Processors in Walvis Bay as head of the quality department and within a year, she took on the responsibility of quality manager.
After leaving NovaNam, Iiyambo went to work for United Fishing Enterprises as quality assurance coordinator and honed her practical skills in leading organizations in implementing and maintaining both IFS and FSSC 22000 food safety certifications.
Her expertise lies in product sampling and testing, hygiene audits, design of documentation and improving food safety systems and statistical analysis.
“It wasn’t easy to get where we are now, and we are still improving on our services, our business. Although we started in 2017, we only started paying ourselves salaries towards the end of 2018. We worked from home and only moved into our offices last year,” she says.
It is evident that both ladies started from the bottom and worked themselves up the corporate ladder.
“Many people have this notion that when you have your degree, you are supposed to walk into a middle management position at a company. That doesn’t happen. Starting from the bottom taught us so much more than any university ever could.”
Both say their main goal for their business is growth.
“This will enable us to transfer our knowledge, which is one of our main goals. What you learn in university isn’t always applicable to reality, and we want to close that gap for graduates entering the job market,” the dynamic duo say.
They also have plans to embark on a nationwide food safety campaign.
“There are campaigns with the same goal, but we feel it needs to be done on a larger scale. Our people don’t realize the importance of food safety.”
They currently provide services to the fishing, hospitality and poultry industries and are also hoping to expand to other industries.
IFAC offers a variety of services, which include awareness training on food safety, FSSC 22000, ISO 22000 training, basic hygiene and cleaning techniques, food safety and quality assurance training, food allergen control management training, food fraud training and onsite food handler’s training for hotel, kitchen, restaurant and catering staff.
They also offer product or facility inspection, GFSI benchmarked schemes’ implementation and audit prep as well as HACCP implementation and audit prep.
IFAC offers pre-inspection of facilities, product label evaluation, assistance with sampling, sourcing of testing laboratories, canned fish inspection, frozen fish inspections, food safety, quality and hygiene investigations as well as preparation of vessels for regulatory authority inspection.
The company also offers technical assistance in research and development of canned fishery product and other value-added products.
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