An apparatus and a method for production control whereby checks for cross contamination removal are made automatically to control whether to load a workpiece into a given working device depending on the work status of that workpiece. A storage unit stores status flags each indicating the work status of the workpiece. The unit also stores either a post-work status flag indicating the work status which the workpiece will be in after status-flag-designated processing by the working device, or a warning flag prohibiting the processing of the workpiece by the working device. A computing unit reads from the storage unit the status flags of the workpiece before the workpiece is loaded into the working device. The computing unit further determines whether the workpiece is suitable for being loaded into the working device in accordance with either the post-work status flag or the warning flag corresponding to the status flags of the workpiece in relation to the working device in question.