The Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) published yesterday a Federal Register notice to inform establishments producing not-ready-to-eat (NRTE) ground or otherwise comminuted chicken and turkey products that they must reassess their Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Points (HACCP) plans because of several recent Salmonella outbreaks associated with consumption of comminuted NRTE turkey products.
No sooner than 90 days following publication of this notice, agency inspection program personnel will begin verifying that establishments that manufacture comminuted NRTE turkey or chicken products, as a final or intermediary product for further processing as NRTE product, have reassessed their HACCP plans for these products.
In addition, FSIS is expanding its Salmonella Verification Sampling Program for Raw Meat and Poultry product to include all forms of non-breaded, non-battered comminuted NRTE poultry product that are not further processing into RTE products in official establishments.
This notice also announces that FSIS will apply its Category 1 performance measure based on current performance standards for ground chicken and turkey product to comminuted poultry. No sooner than 90 days after publication of this notice, the agency will begin sampling to determine the prevalence of Salmonella in comminuted poultry and will use the results from this sampling to develop performance standards for these products.
“The chicken industry will continue to embrace and review science-based approaches that will enhance our food safety efforts,” noted Ashley Peterson, Ph.D., National Chicken Council (NCC) vice president of scientific and regulatory affairs, in a press release in response to the notice. “We look forward to a careful review of the recommendations put forward in this new policy announcement and anticipate offering comments to the agency in the near future.”
NCC also reminded consumers that mechanically separated chicken is not sold directly to U.S. consumers in raw form and products containing it are fully cooked, like hot dogs, bologna and other luncheon meats. If it is used in these products, it must by law be stated on the ingredient statement as “mechanically separated chicken.”
“Ground and mechanically separated chicken plays an important role as a safe, affordable and wholesome protein source in the food supply both here and abroad,” Peterson concluded.
Comments are due to FSIS by March 6, 2013. The Federal Register notice is available here.
