Application of Taguchi design of experiments in the food industry: a systematic literature review

The optimal utilization of available resources is critical for industrial experimentation. In addition, a structured approach with reliable and reproducible results and robust predictability is paramount to achieving profitability, waste reduction, and improvements in the food industry. The Taguchi design of experiments (DOE) is a practical approach that optimizes the critical characteristics using minimum time and resources - reviewing its application in the food sector assists in determining research gaps that could provide sustainable solutions to academia, industry, and policymakers. This research provides a systematic review of the literature on the Taguchi DOE application for the past two decades in the food industry. The systematic review considered articles published in peer-reviewed journals indexed in Scopus, Web of Science, and PubMed databases. The research categorized the relevant articles into three core themes and 31 sub-themes. This study identified only 31 relevant articles despite the significant advantages of applying the Taguchi DOE in the food industry. Most applications did not explore the true potential of the Taguchi DOE approach to obtain robust and scalable solutions. Also, the analysis determined that a structured approach is missing in most studies, with a lack of utilization of essential tools during the research.