Fw: [BITES-L] bites Sep. 20/10
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Date: Mon, 20 Sep 2010 08:11:26 -0500
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bites Sep. 20/10
US: Cracking down on eggs is federal job
TEXAS: Inspection methods varied
SOUTH CAROLINA: Restaurant scorecard - Sept. 17
Consumer evaluations of food risk management in RUSSIA
Benefits of traceability in fish supply chains – case studies
DUBAI in push for food safety database
The potential for third party standards at manufacturing and retail to reduce the risk of listeriosis arising from consumption of Listeria monocytogenes from ready-to-eat foods
SRI LANKA: Food safety and knowledge of hygienic practices among hoteliers
Desiccation survival of Listeria monocytogenes and other potential foodborne pathogens on stainless steel surfaces is affected by different food soils
A HACCP plan for mycotoxigenic hazards associated with Dry-cured meat production processes
Consumers' willingness to pay for safer meat depends on the risk reduction methods – a Danish case study on Salmonella risk in minced pork
Application of in situ loop-mediated isothermal amplification method for detection of Salmonella in foods
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US: Cracking down on eggs is federal job
18.sep.10
Des Moines Register
http://www.desmoinesregister.com/article/20100918/OPINION03/9180310/-1/GETPUBLISHED03WP-CONTENT/Cracking-down-on-eggs-is-federal-job
Two Iowa egg operations are at the heart of a recent salmonella outbreak. It's embarrassing for the state that leads the nation in egg production, and it's alarming when the food supply is contaminated. So some Iowans understandably want the state to take action to better regulate the industry.
Maine, for example, responded to a salmonella outbreak more than 20 years ago by requiring more frequent inspections of facilities and requiring vaccination of hens. Francis Thicke, a Democratic candidate for Iowa agriculture secretary, says Iowa should consider state-specific requirements.
But food safety is primarily the job of the federal government - for good reason. There are big drawbacks to states going it alone.
Perhaps most important, it sets a precedent - and expectation - that such oversight is the proper role of states. It's not. In fact, it's dangerous. This country's system of food production and distribution crosses every state line. It's huge, complicated, national and even international.
. It's the federal government's job to impose uniform regulations for all U.S. food producers - no matter where they're located.
TEXAS: Inspection methods varied
19.sep.10
Amarillo Globe-News
http://amarillo.com/news/local-news/2010-09-19/inspection-methods-varied
Food safety is not just about working by the numbers, but there are a lot of numbers involved.
Inspectors ask questions about food preparation methods and watch for things like how employees wash their hands, but they also add up the numbers.
There are demerit points and varying numbers of days between inspections, and that count is based on which category number a food establishment earns depending on the risk of illness.
Then there are the temperatures and times a food service establishment must hold potentially hazardous food, ph meters to measure acidity or alkalinity and water activity meters that check moisture content.
City regulations are based on state rules.
"In our city ordinance, we make it more restrictive," said Deree Duke, director of Environmental Health, the department that oversees food safety in Amarillo and by contract in Canyon and the rest of Potter and Randall counties.
Typically, the measurements and observations made by the registered sanitarians in the field don't yield dramatic results beyond adjusting sanitizing mixes for the restaurant's cleaning surfaces or putting paper towels at employee hand-washing sinks.
"But if there's an imminent health hazard, we can ask them to voluntarily close," Duke said.
"The sanitarian calls me and we make sure there's a discussion."
If the food establishment manager or owner doesn't comply, the city can seek a court order for closing.
"But that's never happened in the 25 years I've been here."
Disasters are handled differently.
If there is an event like a grease fire, even if the fire suppression equipment in a kitchen puts the flames out quickly, there can be smoke throughout a restaurant.
"Down to the salt and pepper shakers, they have to dump and sanitize them to make sure there's no danger like carcinogens," Duke said.
Other imminent health hazards that will force closure until Environmental Health authorizes reopening include extended interruption of electrical or water service, flood, sewage backup, misuse of poisonous or toxic materials or onset of an apparent foodborne illness outbreak, according to the department's enforcement policy.
Besides the extreme occurances, there are four risk categories that are differentiated in part by how much handling of raw food is involved.
The first is for places like snow cone stands, small bars, convenience stores or motels that serve continental breakfast.
That ranking requires inspection every 180 days.
Risk category II is for locations that do more cooking and reheating of food. They include groceries with delis, bakeries or seafood departments, medium-sized restaurants, school cafeterias and fast food restaurants with no written training procedures or operational procedures in place. Inspectors look at these locations every 90 days.
Risk category III includes facilities that serve people with possibly compromised immune systems such as daycare centers, hospitals, nursing homes and large restaurants. They require inspection every 60 days.
The final category covers cafeterias with extensive handling of hot and cold foods and restaurants that provide 24-hour service of more than 249 people per day. These locations are inspected every 45 days.
Demerits: Mistakes add up
Zero demerits means no major violations like improper cooking techniques or employees not washing hands properly. Fifteen demerits is considered average. Thirty demerits require re-inspection within 24 hours.
• Five demerits are given for unsafe food holding temperatures, heating or cooling improperly, reheating too quickly and other improper techniques.
• Four demerits are given for personnel with infections, inadequate hand washing, poor hygienic practices, cross contamination, inadequate water supply, poor labeling and other practices.
• Three demerits are given for inadequate equipment and hand-washing facilities, insect contamination, rodents, toxic items, lack of properly working thermometers, no permit, no certified food manager and other situations that can cause adulterated food.
• Violations that earn four to five demerits must be corrected within 24 hours in the presence of the inspector, who will also return to re-inspect within 10 days.
• A violation calling for three demerits must be corrected in less than 10 days to be followed by a re-inspection.
SOUTH CAROLINA: Restaurant scorecard - Sept. 17
17.sep.10
WMBF
http://www.wmbfnews.com/story/13174465/restaurant-scorecard-sept-17?redirected=true
The South Carolina Department of Health and Environmental Control aims at improving food safety at area restaurants through a statewide inspection initiative.
The results, which are made available to the public, are based off of a 100 point checklist that inspects 50 areas of each chosen establishment. The lowest grade a restaurant can receive is a "C" rating, or 70 to 77 points.
The following are two of the latest restaurant inspection results in Myrtle Beach:
Tavern in the Forest | 4999 Carolina Forest Blvd., Myrtle Beach
Overall Grade: 85 - B
A Sept. 10 surprise inspection at Tavern in the Forest led a DHEC employee to find dirty food-contact surfaces of kitchenware, such as pots and pans, slicers, knives and cutting boards.
An inspector also found soap and/or paper towels not provided at the bar area and dirty speed racks behind the bar.
Other violations noted in the Sept. 10 inspection report included floors that needed to be cleaned under all kitchen equipment and storage areas.
Sharkey's Restaurant | 1316 Celebrity Circle, Myrtle Beach
Overall Grade: 78 - B
An inspection on Sept. 14 found potentially hazardous food not held below 45 degrees of above 130 degrees. An inspector also found a pot of cold meat sauce sitting out at 60 degrees.
Further inspection also led DHEC to find food not stored 6 inches off the floor and food that was uncovered in storage. Employee drinks were also observed on prep surfaces, in addition to a dirty hand sink.
Other violations noted on the health inspection report included a dirty ware washing sink, a utensil washing sink that was not maintained and dirty floors under kitchen equipment.
Consumer evaluations of food risk management in RUSSIA
19.sep.10
British Food Journal, Vol. 112 Iss: 9, pp.934 – 948
Ksenia Popova, Lynne J. Frewer, Janneke De Jonge, Arnout Fischer, Ellen Van Kleef
http://www.emeraldinsight.com/journals.htm?articleid=1881801&show=abstract
Abstract
Purpose – Consumer perceptions regarding what constitutes best food risk management (FRM) practice may vary as a consequence of cross-cultural differences in consumer perceptions, cultural contexts, and historical differences in governance practices and occurrence of food safety incidents. The purpose of this paper is to compare the views of Russian consumers with those of consumers in European Union member states.
Design/methodology/approach – A survey previously conducted in five EU member states was replicated using a Russian consumer sample (n=460, SEM analysis). Psychological factors underpinning consumer evaluations of food risk management quality (FRMQ) were identified. A qualitative study (consumer focus group, n=9) allowed for in-depth interpretation of the quantitative results.
Findings – Russian consumers hold similar views to consumers in EU member states regarding their perceptions of what constitutes effective FRM practices. However, the perceived honesty of food chain actors was an important determinant of perceived FRMQ only for Russian consumers, who also perceived that they were primarily responsible for their own food-related health protection. EU consumers attributed more responsibility to food chain actors and the authorities.
Research limitations/implications – The analysis compared Russian consumers with consumers in five different EU member states. The results cannot be extended to compare Russian consumers with the entire EU.
Practical implications – An international risk communication policy is likely to be impractical, and should be developed at a national or regional level. Given that Russian consumers take personal responsibility for their own health protection, information needs to be provided to enable them to do so.
Originality/value – To the authors knowledge, this is the first comparative analysis of the determinants of perceptions of effective FRM held by Russian consumers with consumers from within the EU regulatory area.
Benefits of traceability in fish supply chains – case studies
19.sep.10
British Food Journal, Vol. 112 Iss: 9, pp.976 – 1002
Nga Mai, Sigurdur Gretar Bogason, Sigurjon Arason, Sveinn Víkingur Árnason, Thórólfur Geir Matthíasson
http://www.emeraldinsight.com/journals.htm?articleid=1881804&show=abstract
Abstract
Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to investigate how the seafood industry perceives benefits of traceability implementation. Furthermore, ex ante cost-benefit analyses (CBAs) of adopting new traceability systems are conducted for two firms, operating at different steps of the seafood supply chains, to obtain preliminary knowledge on the net benefits of the project and on how costs and benefits are distributed among the actors.
Design/methodology/approach – This is a case-based study.
Findings – The surveyed companies perceive improving supply chain management as the most important benefit of traceability. Other benefits are increase of the ability to retain existing customers; product quality improvement; product differentiation; and reduction of customer complaints. However, the quantifiable benefits are perceived differently by the actors at different steps in the supply chains, e.g. implementing radio frequency identification (RFID) tags on pallets in the seafood trading company case study shows tangibly quantifiable benefits.
Originality/value – The paper is useful for both practitioners and academics regarding perceived benefits of traceability in fish supply chains. The research provides initial insight into seafood companies' perspectives on the benefits of adopting RFID-based traceability solutions. The paper suggests that the financial burden of implementing traceability may be borne by the processing firms, while gains are reaped by firms in the distribution business closer to the end consumer. This could provide a partial explanation as to why traceability has been slow to gain ground as a visible value-adding marketing tool, and is mainly being driven by food safety regulations.
DUBAI in push for food safety database
19.sep.10
The National
Maey El Shoush
http://www.thenational.ae/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20100920/NATIONAL/709199838/1010
Officials from the municipality, police and health departments will meet next week to continue work towards a central database for food safety complaints. By creating a central tracking system, the emirate's hospitals would be able to reduce the impact of any food-borne infection outbreak, according to Dr Ali al Marzouqi, head of public health and safety at the Dubai Health Authority.
"If we establish something where you can quickly track potential causes [of food poisoning], it would be a very good thing," Dr al Marzouqi said. "When it comes to food poisoning, immediate action needs to be taken to minimise the effect." The number of critical food poisoning cases in Dubai has rapidly decreased, and account for only one to two per cent of total complaints received by the Dubai Municipality's Food Control Department.
The remaining cases are split between major complaints including cases of food contamination and minor cases related to violations of hygiene, according to the municipality. The director of the Food Control Department, Khalid Sharif al Awadhi, said they are developing ways to combat breaches of food safety rules and regulations. "During the Dubai International Food Safety Conference held in February, we had a workshop with the US Centers for Disease Control on how to best harmonise procedures and investigations," Mr al Awadhi said. "Since then, we have had various meetings with health authorities about implementing this and will hold another meeting next week."
Mr al Awadhi said most of the food in the UAE is imported and passes strict inspections before going through a port of entry. Dr Abdulla al Khayat, chief executive of Al Wasl Hospital in Dubai and a paediatrician, said the emirate's main women and children's hospital is also working to implement a broader in-house poisoning alert system to better manage information about toxic poisoning cases. Alerting staff to a possible outbreak of infection at a restaurant or hotel, for example, before any cases arrived would be of huge benefit, he said, particularly when it comes to young patients.
The potential for third party standards at manufacturing and retail to reduce the risk of listeriosis arising from consumption of Listeria monocytogenes from ready-to-eat foods
17.sep.10
Food Control
Anett Winkler and Matilda Freund
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=ArticleURL&_udi=B6T6S-511TN9R-1&_user=10&_coverDate=09%2F17%2F2010&_rdoc=1&_fmt=high&_orig=search&_origin=search&_sort=d&_docanchor=&view=c&_acct=C000050221&_version=1&_urlVersion=0&_userid=10&md5=37faf1ba370a731ef50da4c3cc55855c&searchtype=a
Abstract
Many third party standards are published that are either part of regional regulations or provide guidance on the control of Listeria monocytogenes in foodstuffs. These standards deal with different steps / control options for Listeria monocytogenes. Whereas microbiological criteria as outlined in EC regulation 2073/2005 are useful in setting performance objectives within the whole food chain, guidance on challenge studies provides the basis for harmonized approaches within industry and food safety authorities to evaluate L. monocytogenes growth potential in different foods. Other guidance documents aim towards ways of more effective Listeria control at manufacturing. The setting of governmental process and product standards link into food safety management systems by manufacturers and retailers, thereby guiding their food safety activities. The value of third party standards is discussed in conjunction with valuable inputs that can be provided by businesses having long-term experiences in related fields. Third party standards are increasingly valuable for firms to interact with partners in the food chain, so that good science plays a role in providing safe and wholesome products for the consumer without excessive government interference. Firms with long term experiences in processing and marketing food can be important contributors to third party standards.
SRI LANKA: Food safety and knowledge of hygienic practices among hoteliers
20.sep.10
Daily Mirror
P. C. Arampath
http://www.dailymirror.lk/print/index.php/business/127-local/21879.html
Food safety and hygienic practices utilised in the food service sector, restaurants, hotels and catering services play an important function in ensuring that safe food is available for consumption. Food hygiene is in essence, the practices involved in the business of healthy food production, thus ensuring the availability of safe food. Serving such food is the most important task of authorities deemed with the responsibility of preparing and serving food.
Safe foods ensure minimal risks and hazards to human health through protecting and preventing edible substances from becoming hazardous in the presence of chemical, physical and biological contaminants that deteriorate or spoil food. The every day consumer believes that food offered by caterers or hoteliers are generally safe. Therefore they readily accept and enjoy such food on offer. Yet, sadly due to a lack of transparency, consumers fail to realise the problems created by caterers and hoteliers that arise from the quality of raw materials used, the premises utilised for food preparation, hygienic practices and conditions in the kitchen and very significantly the hygiene of food handlers themselves. Therefore compromising on any of these factors would subsequently result in outbreaks of food borne diseases, in the event contaminated food is ingested.
All food business industries should be registered, and possess a valid license covering legal requirements as stipulated by the state. The food preparation premises should be inspected by a public health inspector or a food inspector of the Divisional Secretariat, prior to receiving a business licence. Irrespective of these requirements some caterers and hoteliers conduct their businesses devoid of the licence and with inadequate facilities.
Unsanitary food preparatory measures have led to grave complications among the consuming public. Among the outstanding and numerous reasons for such predicaments, the major issues are -
a) The lack of adequate space for the business.
b) Indifferent and uninterested attitudes of food handlers.
c) Lack of management interest and guidance.
d) Negligence and uncaring mind-sets of the food inspectors or public health inspectors.
These setbacks are not centralised or limited to cities but also exist beyond them. Consumers as well, through necessity, unintentionally encourage illegal food businesses. Mobile street food stalls and transportable night booths on the roadsides are primary examples. Consuming food from such carts and booths should be completely avoided. One could observe such kiosks in the cities providing ready-to-consume foods often serving hygienically compromised meals. Most often a single container of water would be repeatedly used to wash plates and cups which would soon become an unsanitary and contaminated pool of liquid.
A solitary individual often performs all activities of say, slicing bread and making sandwiches. A sanitary glove is seldom seen anywhere near them. The same wet hands used to clean cutlery and crockery are used to handle money as well. Coins and currency notes in the form of change are one of the foremost carriers of microscopic pathogens and infectious micro organisms.
It is the responsibility of the public to avoid such places and discourage others from such eating practices. The government carries the authority to ensure safe food preparation and serving and the scrutinising power has been vested with the Medical Officer of Health, Food Inspector, and Public Health Inspector of the region. Food producers who prepare and sell unhealthy food should be prosecuted and brought before courts for contravening the food act and for making, serving and selling unsanitary food.
Medium and large scale hoteliers should be equipped with substantial know-how on food hygiene and safety. Food businesses not only cater to locals but also to guests of foreign origin. Visitors especially from Asian regions like to eat out even though they occupy the best of hotels. Therefore it is essential to implement and uplift food hygiene and safety practices.
At the present time, in order to ensure competitive and safe food businesses in the medium and large scale hotels, maintenance of good hygienic practices (GHP) together with adequate food safety rules, should be made compulsory for competitive food ventures. By providing quality services to consumers, it would be easy to build up reassurances on food safety amongst consumers.
Incorporation of HACCP (Hazards analysis and critical control points) and implementation ISO 22000: 2005 food safety management system (FSMS) to the food business would be highly effective and beneficial in completely avoiding food contamination and related flaws. Gaining HACCP or ISO22000: 2005 assures a safe and quality food supply.
Based on a recent survey it was found that the average knowledge of the hoteliers on food hygiene and safety was not satisfactory. The recognised and established practices were almost the same, irrespective of the size or class of the hotel. Most of the prominent and well known hotels had recruited personnel on strict guidelines conforming to sound food safety and hygienic principles.
However, with medium and small hotel sector recruitment patterns, this was not the situation. Within the hotel sector of the city of Colombo, several drawbacks were observed due to a lack of knowledge and negligence of people who should know better, leading invariably to lower customer confidence and a decline in business. Such hotels recruit personnel to perform various functions and ad hoc hotel activities in general. Whereas worker training should be effectively applied, prioritised and limited to specific duties, covering food hygiene and safety standards in these organizations well thought-out, pre-arranged awareness training programmes were not conducted for the food handlers, in order to bring them up to par in such knowledge.
In such a situation it is imperative that proper training of food handlers ought to be implemented towards maintaining satisfactory standards.
Turning towards the purchasing of raw materials, such buying should be done through careful observation and supervision. Purchasing of cheap or sub standard raw materials was seen as a downside with reference to certain hotels, and several shortcomings were noted concerning these raw materials.
Absence of appropriate labeling.
Flattened and damaged containers of canned items.
Poultry products past expiry date.
Name and address of manufacturer, date of production and date of expiry missing.
A hotel's purchasing manager has to be vigilant especially on receipt of animal products such as poultry, fish, and mutton, pork etc. Only products conforming to the set food regulations meeting the requirements of proper refrigeration and accepted ambient temperatures should be accepted. Compromising on norms of correct refrigeration would lead to possible food poisoning or other related diseases. Consequently acquiring quality raw materials from reputed suppliers properly refrigerated and with adequate time gaps for expiry is vital.
The storage of raw materials should be maintained on a (First in First Out - FIFO) basis. Purchasing food items or raw materials with SLS certification (SLS mark) or ordering from HACCP or ISO 22000: 2005 certified pre guaranteed industries, would eliminate risk of unsafe raw materials ensuring safety.
A hotel's cold storage facilities must be well maintained through periodic examinations of thermometers and recording of temperatures on a regular basis. Clean-up of freezers should also be done quite frequently. Mixed storage of raw and cooked meats and other victuals, together with ice cream and precooked items (i.e. meat, chicken, seafood) should be completely done away with.
Cross contamination of food, for example the thawing of meat items should be done in a separate location in order to avoid contamination through drippings of the thawed items. Even temperature control of finished foods on display (for example buffet items) is limited only to a few hotels in Colombo.
Cleaning chemicals, sanitisers and disinfectants purchased should be recorded separately and used in appropriate dilution as instructed on the labels. Such detergents and disinfects should be stored at separate and isolated locations preferably in detergent closets away from the food handling areas.
Regular medical tests of food handlers and maintenance of such records ensure a useful purpose. They have a direct bearing on the food safety aspect. The importance of swab sampling from food handlers, swab tests of food contact surfaces (from the raw material provider's table top, to the preparation table of the hotel kitchen) cannot be underestimated. Food establishments should motivate their employees and emphasise the harm caused through food contaminations with its accompanying hazards and also educate them of the benefits accrued through the adaptation of safe food habits. (HACCP or ISO22000:2005) would be the best solutions towards maintaining food hygiene and food safety in an eating establishment.
Taking these matters into consideration, the Colombo Municipal Council (CMC) signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with the Ceylon National Chamber of Industries (CNCI) with the intention of upgrading food safety and hygiene standards of food manufacturing and catering industries within the city limits of Colombo.
In accordance with the MOU both the CMC and the CNCI are now occupied in an exercise aimed at launching a new grading system. As the corresponding organisation of the CNCI, the newly inaugurated Ind-Expo Certification (Pvt.) Ltd. is currently working closely with the CMC to spearhead and initiate the launching ceremony.
Ind-Expo Certification (Pvt.) Ltd is a joint venture between the CNCI and the National Chamber of Exporters of Sri Lanka (NCE). It is supported by the United Nations Industrial Development Organisation (UNIDO) IP Programme phase 2 in Sri Lanka. This in turn is implemented in affiliation with the Ministry of Industrial Development, under the project - "Strengthening International certification capacity in Sri Lanka. It has particular reference to Social Accountability Standard (SA 8000) and Food Safety (HACCP/ISO 22000) Standard" and is a project funded by the Royal Norwegian Government.
The grading scheme is known as "Crowns for Food Hygiene" and is similar to a system practiced in the United Kingdom. Ind-Expo and the CMC have jointly commenced the assessment of the pilot project for this scheme based on the criteria provided by UNIDO. The core objective of the "Crowns for Food Hygiene" is to encourage food catering establishments to practice safer food hygiene practices offering safer food to their patrons.
It would be an additional advantage as more clients would patronise their outlets. Crowns thus awarded would be valid for one year (conditions apply.) the successful award winning establishments would be able to put on show the number of crowns they had received. With reference to this project Ind-Expo has carried out a series of internationally recognised training programmes as put down by the Chartered Institute of Environmental Health, in United Kingdom - (CIEH -UK) Level 1 and Level 2 training on Food Safety management. Ind-Expo is in addition, a registered centre of the CIEH - UK. It is authorised to deliver food safety, environmental management and cccupational health and safety qualifications within Sri Lanka. CIEH-UK is also one of the leading providers of internationally accredited vocational training qualifications in food safety and related subjects. Ind-Expo has conducted a series of training programmes of the CIEH to train over 200 trainees from all catering and manufacturing industries in Sri Lanka.
The writer is a Senior Lecturer at the Department of Food Science & Technology
Faculty of Agriculture, University of Peradeniya
Desiccation survival of Listeria monocytogenes and other potential foodborne pathogens on stainless steel surfaces is affected by different food soils
19.sep.10
Food Control
Shintaro Kuramoto, Satoko Miya and Bon Kimura
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=ArticleURL&_udi=B6T6S-5125R3V-1&_user=10&_coverDate=09%2F19%2F2010&_rdoc=1&_fmt=high&_orig=search&_origin=search&_sort=d&_docanchor=&view=c&_acct=C000050221&_version=1&_urlVersion=0&_userid=10&md5=33cc543866857aab37da6daafe5ed8e1&searchtype=a
Abstract
Food processing environments are suspected to be the primary source of Listeria monocytogenes contamination of foods. We investigated the survival of L. monocytogenes on stainless steel that was soiled with food components (minced tuna, ground pork, and cabbage) followed by dehydration. Stainless steel coupons were inoculated with 107 CFU/coupon and stored up to 30 days. In comparison with Staphylococcus aureus and Salmonella Typhimurium, L. monocytogenes demonstrated the highest survivability where about 3 log CFU/coupon remained at the end of the experimental period. While survival during the early storage period was markedly affected by both food-component attachment and food type, a long dehydration period diminished the effect of those.
A HACCP plan for mycotoxigenic hazards associated with Dry-cured meat production processes
19.sep.10
Food Control
Cathrine F. Kure, Ragnhild O. Gjerde, Solveig Langsrud, Mohamed K. Omer, Truls Nesbakken and Ida Skaar
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=ArticleURL&_udi=B6T6S-5125R3V-2&_user=10&_coverDate=09%2F19%2F2010&_rdoc=1&_fmt=high&_orig=search&_origin=search&_sort=d&_docanchor=&view=c&_acct=C000050221&_version=1&_urlVersion=0&_userid=10&md5=a06aae9c9a03903e24e83c8159ae773b&searchtype=a
Abstract
This work provided a HACCP plan for mycotoxigenic hazards associated with dry-cured meat production facility. Mycotoxigenic hazards that could emerge at each stage of the production were described. Pathogenic yeasts, toxigenic moulds and their toxic secondary metabolites were identified as the potential hazards. Smoking and the dry-ripening stages of production were the critical control points identified. Critical limits for the critical control points were set based on scientific premises and recommendations set by legislative authorities. The status of the critical limits at the identified critical control points need to be monitored, verified and recorded.
Consumers' willingness to pay for safer meat depends on the risk reduction methods – a Danish case study on Salmonella risk in minced pork
19.sep.10
Food Control
Tove Christensen, and Dorte Gyrd-Hansen
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=ArticleURL&_udi=B6T6S-5125R3V-4&_user=10&_coverDate=09%2F19%2F2010&_rdoc=1&_fmt=high&_orig=search&_origin=search&_sort=d&_docanchor=&view=c&_acct=C000050221&_version=1&_urlVersion=0&_userid=10&md5=59dc487400067e83f10147bf005edb90&searchtype=a
Abstract
A choice experiment was conducted to elicit the extent to which consumers´ willingness to pay (WTP) for reducing Salmonella risks in minced pork depends on how risk reductions are obtained. Three different risk reduction methods were analysed: Risk reduction on the farm and decontamination of carcasses using either hot water/steam or lactic acid. The sample consisted of 844 Danish consumers who participated in an Internet based survey. We found that consumers were willing to pay for risk reductions, but they disliked all the risk reduction methods they were confronted with. Indeed, consumers were willing to pay a price premium for a complete elimination of Salmonella in minced pork but only if it was obtained at the farm level. Hence, our results indicate that consumers demand safer meat although it depends on the risk reduction method. We also found that consumers preferred the status quo to all other combinations of risk reduction and risk reduction methods.
Application of in situ loop-mediated isothermal amplification method for detection of Salmonella in foods
19.sep.10
Food Control
Bin Wang, Fan Huang, Yongsheng Song, He Yan, Mohammad Jahangir Alam, Shinji Yamasaki, and Lei Shi
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=ArticleURL&_udi=B6T6S-5125R3V-3&_user=10&_coverDate=09%2F19%2F2010&_rdoc=1&_fmt=high&_orig=search&_origin=search&_sort=d&_docanchor=&view=c&_acct=C000050221&_version=1&_urlVersion=0&_userid=10&md5=b8507ffc47b16dae7a4f9a0468892f56&searchtype=a
Abstract
In situ loop-mediated isothermal amplification (in situ LAMP) as a novel technique for detection of food-borne pathogens, has been successfully applied to detect Salmonella in artificially contaminated eggshells. Escherichia coli C600 was used as a negative control in specificity experiment. The sensitivity of the in situ LAMP assay was confirmed by the test in serial 10-fold dilutions of Salmonella cells, and the detection limit of this method may reach 1 CFU/cm2 on eggshells. Compared with traditional culture methods and PCR-based methods, the in situ LAMP assay is advantageous on rapidity, high specificity, less time consumption and ease in operation. This is the first study carried out to apply the in situ LAMP method in practical food-borne pathogens detection. The results indicate that this method has great potential for use in food safety laboratories.
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