Month: March 2017

Environmental Monitoring

#ScrapTheWaste in Your Environmental Monitoring Program

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We are constantly challenged to do more with less: trim the fat, reduce costs, eliminate the scrap, etc. Simply look at your environmental monitoring program; the amount of time and money organizations spend clinging to manual, paper-based systems may surprise you.

The process at 30,000 feet doesn’t seem very complicated: sample your sites/locations, send the samples to the lab, receive the results, and report the findings. No problem, right?

It’s not until we examine the individual steps of the process that we discover the waste. Continue Reading

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Sanitation

Technical Tuesdays: The Role of Sanitation in the Preventive Controls Rule For Human Food

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For over 20 years, the food industry has been steadfast in our view of the role of sanitation in classical Hazard Analysis Critical Control Point (HACCP) programs. Our experience with meat and poultry HACCP by way of the International HACCP Alliance and what came later with Global Food Safety Initiative (GFSI) HACCP requirements solidified the supportive role of sanitation as a food safety prerequisite program. We have managed sanitation as a separate prerequisite program, and then used these programs to eliminate the need for sanitation critical control points. However, compliance with the Preventive Controls Rule for Human Food (PCHF) as part of the Food Safety Modernization Act requires a different approach in how we manage sanitation procedures that directly addresses a food safety hazard identified in the hazard analysis. Continue Reading

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Supply Chain

The Importance of Data in Managing Your Food Supply Chain

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Food quality and supply chain professionals are being forced to make acrobatic decisions on a daily basis to help ensure the safety of your brand and the continuity of your supply chain. As a professional, you rely on historical know-how and industry experience to be able to drive your decisions on both a daily and long-term strategic basis. Operational saving demands, brand safety and the need to be more competitive, all with less and less resources, are just some of the factors that are starting to be expected on a regular basis.  Continue Reading

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Nutrition Regulatory Update

Regulatory Round-Up: What is a ‘Healthy’ Food? – FDA Reconsidering the Definition of ‘Healthy’

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What is a “healthy” food? Should a “healthy” food contain specific levels of vitamins and minerals? Conversely, should a “healthy” food limit potentially harmful components such as saturated fat, cholesterol, sugar or sodium? Questions surrounding the definition of a “healthy” labeling claim have surged in recent years due to the rising consumer demand for nutritious foods. Continue Reading

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Chemistry

3 Key Facts to Know About Ractopamine

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The mid- 2000s saw the rise of ractopamine as a prominent growth promoting agent for the meat industry. Suppliers in this industry are probably familiar with ractopamine, but manufacturers using meat in their products may not know much about its use and effects. We’ve pulled together the top 3 facts to know about ractopamine: Continue Reading

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Chemistry

What are Dioxins?: Understanding the Sources and Health Effects

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Most people are aware of typical environmental contaminants that are produced as a result of modern human activity, such as carbon monoxide, nitrogen dioxide, and particulate matter. Residents of larger cities may even be familiar with the visible smog that can engulf a skyline as a result of these air pollutants.

Aside from the common ones, other toxic contaminants exist in the environment that may be lesser-known by the general population, but can be just as harmful to humans. The word, “dioxins” refers to a group of compounds that includes dioxins, furans, and certain polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs). These structurally similar compounds are produced inadvertently as a result of large scale combustion activities such as incineration, thermal metal processes, and car exhaust. PCBs were actually intentionally produced during the mid twentieth century to be used in transformer oil, coolant fluids, carbonless copy paper, and plasticizers, until their manufacture was banned by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) in 1979. Continue Reading

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Environmental Monitoring

Technical Tuesday: Using Whole Genome Sequencing to Better Decode Listeria Outbreaks

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The practice of whole genome sequencing (WGS) has received a great deal of attention in the food industry and among industry trade associations in recent years. Whole genome sequencing is a process that uses laboratory methods to determine or map the complete DNA sequence of an organism’s genome. Each microorganism has a unique genetic fingerprint that can be identified and traced using WGS. Continue Reading

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Regulatory Update

Regulatory Round-Up: Keys to Preventing Undeclared Allergens and Reducing Recalls

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A decade ago, allergens were an uncommon cause of meat and poultry product recalls in the United States. The proportion of meat and poultry products recalled annually due to allergens steadily increased from 8% in 2008 to 35% in 2012 due to increased awareness of the issue by inspection personnel and establishments. Moreover, the total number of recall events involving meat and poultry products due to undeclared allergens increased 103% between the calendar years 2012 and 2015. Undeclared allergens have now become the leading reason for recalls of meat and poultry products from the U.S. marketplace. Continue Reading

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