OPTIMIZATION of WHEAT AND FLOUR BLENDING FOR COST MINIMIZATION BY USING MATHEMATICAL MODELLING

Year 2017, Özel Sayı - ICEBSS 2017, 264 - 272, 10.11.2017

Birol Elevli , Hakan Öztürk , Zafer Kacır

Abstract

Flour producer produce flour by mixing different wheat having different quality characteristics grown in different region. The wheat grown under different environmental conditions may have variable quality characteristics. This variation occurs on the basis of region and time period. However, producer must blend the wheat having different quality characteristics to produce flour with constant/standard quality in order to satisfy customer. In addition, it is necessary to blend different flours and add additives in order to provide specific flours. Although blending of wheat and flour is an everyday process for the flour producer to produce desired quality flour, the blending process is usually far from the optimization. It depends on mainly the experience of the flour producer. In other words, this blending process is carried out by trial / error method. However, the optimization methods providing optimum blending for cost minimization exist. In this study, the flour mill located in Samsun have been investigated and based on the mill working conditions, a mathematical model was developed for the wheat and flour blending problem. An interface has been developed to solve the developed mathematical model using MS Excel Solver. When the desired wheat and flour properties are entered to the created interface, the solution will be found with the established model and the lowest cost mixing ratio will be obtained. As a result of this implementation, it has been observed that this approach reduces the company's costs by 5-10% per day.

Keywords

Blending, Flour production, Integer programming, Excel solver, Optimization

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