When a person walks into a grocery store and picks up a package of sliced deli meat, there would be two things that person would do: First, he or she would look at the expiration date, then that person would look at the overall appearance of the meat inside.
The meat industry has a very successful track record of controlling Listeria. In the U.S., the meat industry has not issued a Listeria recall due to illness from a federally inspected product since 2002.
Something as simple as improper care, cleaning and handling of uniforms and garments can lead to product contamination by introducing a microbial or foreign material risk to product. Not to be taken lightly, proper apparel care has become a part of many processors’ culture.
The headlines — “Horse Meat Scandal Rocks the EU” or “Feds Indict Four in Salmonella Outbreak” — demonstrate it clearly: Food safety and quality issues and the responses to them are at an all-time high.
FSIS is amending the Federal meat and poultry products inspection regulations to allow for the use of sodium benzoate, sodium propionate, and benzoic acid as antimicrobials in certain ready-to-eat meat and poultry products.