Category: Food Safety

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Food Safety Trade

India allows in-transit cold treatment for Australian Fruits

The Indian government has announced market improvements to allow in-transit cold treatment of Australian top fruit, summer fruit and table grapes. Agriculture Minister David Littleproud says India’s approval of in-transit cold treatment of a variety of fruits is a major breakthrough for Australia’s growers. This approval to use in-transit cold treatment is expected to boost export volumes of Australian fruits such as table grapes, apple, pears and summer fruits.

The internationally accepted commercial cold treatment requirement for fruit flies is a minimum uninterrupted fruit pulp temperature and exposure time combination. The minimum cold treatment temperature for fruit flies in grapes, pears, plums and nectarines destined for India is 10 days at or below 0,0°C (32°F). For Ceratitis capitata, Mediterranean fruit fly, the treatment schedule is -3°C or below for 20 days and for Bactrocera trying, Queensland fruit fly, the treatment schedule is -3°C or below for 16 days.

Manual of Importing Country Requirements, Australia

The main benefit of cold treating products as it is transported, it gets to the market quicker and the exporter can charge a premium based on increased freshness. India offers a massive market of young, health conscious and vegetarian consumers seeking high quality fresh and safe fruit and vegetables. In 2019, Australia exported to India $830k worth of table grapes, $352k apples and pears and $180k summer fruit.

In addition to this, Indian government also approved phosphine fumigation of malting barley. Fumigation using phosphine will save industry up to $10 per tonne exported compared to treatment with methyl bromide. There has been growth in the consumption of beer in India and Australia is known worldwide for its high-quality malting barley. The Indian malt market is estimated at 500,000 tonnes, worth over $100 million dollars, and it is anticipated Australia could gain a fair proportion of that market in 2021.

Read more at Australian Government Media

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Food Safety Supply Chain

It’s not the food supply chain that’s breaking, it’s the meat supply chain

Supply lines across the food industry have been impacted by the coronavirus. Shuttered restaurants, university dining halls, workplace food providers, and more have all strained the food supply chain. In particular, the meat industry has suffered the hardest hit. In addition to closures of many of its largest purchasers, COVID-19 outbreaks inside meatpacking facilities have forced largest meat processing plants to shut down. The cold, damp conditions and crowded workstations in meatpacking plants make infectious diseases particularly hard to control.

On April 26, Tyson Foods Inc., the biggest U.S. meat processor, closed at least six major plants. Similar covid-19 outbreaks were reported at Danish Crown A/S, a huge pork producer; Goikoa, of Spain; Sanderson Farms Inc., America’s third-largest poultry producer, and Cargill’s High River slaughterhouse outside Calgary. The whole situation is an incontrovertible nightmare. But the pandemic is an opportunity to ask more probing questions about the nature of our system of animal agriculture.

Since COVID-19 began, we’ve seen plant-based product sales growth exceed that of animal-based products, both in meat and dairy categories. In the United States, sales of vegan meat jumped by a staggering 280% and sales of oat milk jumped by 477% in the second week of March compared to the same period last year, as the country became the epicenter of the coronavirus pandemic. This meat crisis has become a big opportunity for plant-based protein companies that have developed healthier, safer and more environmentally friendly alternatives to traditional animal products.

Choosing a plant-based diet is one of the best things you can do for the environment as plant-based diets are kind to the earth and kind to animals. As is the case with plant-based meat, plant-based dairy supply chains are much better poised to respond in real-time to changing market conditions and are not vulnerable to the type of disruptions inherent in industrial animal agriculture.

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Food Safety

Food safety violations: Chipotle to pay $25 million fine

Chipotle Mexican Grill Inc. will pay $25 million to resolve criminal charges related to the company’s involvement in foodborne illness outbreaks that sickened more than 1,100 people between 2015 and 2018, according to the Department of Justice. This case highlights why it is important for restaurants and members of the food services industry to ensure that managers and employees consistently follow food safety policies. According to the factual statement in the DPA, which the company agreed was true, Chipotle was implicated in at least five foodborne illness outbreaks between 2015 and 2018 connected to restaurants in the Los Angeles area, Boston, Virginia, and Ohio.

For example, in December 2015, a norovirus incident at a Chipotle restaurant in Boston sickened 141 people. In July 2018, approximately 647 people who dined at a Chipotle restaurant in Powell, Ohio reported illness related to Clostridium perfringens, a pathogen that grows rapidly when food is not held at appropriate temperatures.

This incident clearly implicates that the priority to produce food economically and efficiently comes with a strong reason to produce safe food. Losses due to lost revenue in the case of food safety issues may far exceed the cost of maintaining safety. Lost revenues includes a missed opportunity to sell the products, cost of discarded products, business interruption, customer reimbursement and the biggest one is loss of credibility among the consumers.

Read more at AgDaily