Pembroke abattoir blasts OMAF enforcement of new sausage making guidelines

Thursday, May 15, 2014

morguefile photo

by SUSAN MANN

The provincial agriculture ministry’s new enforcement measures of Health Canada’s fermented sausage and dried meat product guidelines have the operators of one eastern Ontario processor questioning why the province’s meat inspectors aren’t helping slaughterhouses meet new requirements.

Kevin Schoenfeldt, whose wife’s family owns Reiche Meat Products Ltd. of Pembroke, says “the meat inspection here hasn’t been very good. They’re not helping you.”

“They (government inspectors) used to help you and be helpful and work with you but now it just seems like they’re the warden and you’re a prisoner.”

The family business is a provincially licensed abattoir that slaughters and processes beef, pigs and lambs, mostly for local farmers. Sausage making is a key part of the business.
 
In April, during a routine inspection, ministry inspectors asked Reiche to hold back a 200-pound batch of German-smoked sausages for testing of the bacteria staph enterotoxin. It’s one of the toxins responsible for staphylococcal food poisoning.

The business opted to condemn the whole batch because to do the testing — $2,850 to evaluate the 19 samples the ministry required — would have cost more than what the $4.99 a pound sausage could have recouped.

Moreover, it was only during the hold back that Reiche’s operators learned that the ministry classified their sausage as a fermented product and, to meet regulations, they must change their sausage recipe.

Jeffrey Bennett, the company’s manager, questions why he wasn’t told seven years ago when the company bought its commercial smoker that additional ingredients, such as starter culture, sugar and increased salt, were needed to control staph enterotoxin.

Bennett, who wants to buy the business, says he did talk to his area manager because he’s unhappy with the way his situation was handled. “If it’s serious enough that someone could get sick or, like they (ministry inspectors) said, possibly even die from this particular bacteria if their immune system is compromised, then it should have been important enough that someone should have noticed it before now,” he says.

The additional ingredients needed to satisfy current government guidelines add 25 to 30 cents a pound to the processing costs and several hours to their fabrication. “You just have to hand that down to the customers,” Bennett says.

Moreover, the new ingredients change the taste of the sausage, and even though the change is slight, there is the chance it can put off some customers, he says. “Sausage customers are very picky about their sausages. They notice the smallest things.”

Schoenfeldt says today’s business environment is extremely tough. “It’s hard enough now with the hydro being so high and before businesses used to pay you to take away the bones and remnants in the slaughterhouse but now you have to pay to get that taken away.” There are so many “added costs in slaughterhouses and that’s why there’s so many people folding up.”

Susan Murray, Ontario Ministry of Agriculture and Food spokesperson, says by email all provincial plants were notified in April 2013 that ministry staff would be enforcing the guidelines.

Enforcement of the Health Canada guidelines began Jan. 1.

Murray says enforcement “includes a more proactive approach. Instead of only testing end products for pathogens, and reacting to adverse results, ministry staff now review processes used to make the meat products to see if they line up with the guidelines.”

Enforcing the guidelines is important because “products such as fermented sausage and died meats are higher risk for food safety because of the processes used for their production,” she explains.

So far, the Reiche sausages are one of two adverse results for indicators and five adverse results for pathogens found at provincially licensed meat plants. When adverse results were found ministry staff “took measures to ensure no products were released on the market and worked with operators to implement corrective actions,” Murray says.

The ministry provides a range of options for “achieving the same safe food outcome,” she says.

Murray says the Reiche meat plant has not had any recalls to date. “Routine testing had previously found adverse results for indicator organisms, which indicate the need for ongoing diligence with food safety best practices,” she notes.

But Murray says she is not able to “provide specific results as this is confidential plant information.”

The meat inspection program has a complaints resolution process for concerns about an inspector’s approach, she adds. People can contact their area manager and if still unsatisfied, their regional manager, with complaints. If the complaint is about a regulatory matter, plant operators can request a hearing, she notes.

There are currently 129 provincially licensed abattoirs and 382 freestanding meat plants in Ontario. An abattoir strictly slaughters animals and maybe cuts and wraps the meat while a freestanding meat plant does additional processing. BF