Philip Derfler, deputy administrator at the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Food Safety and Inspection Service, touted the new proposed rule on poultry inspection last week at a Food and Drug Law Institute's conference.
Under current policy, FSIS is responsible for examining all poultry carcasses for blemishes or visible defects before they are further processed. Under the proposed rule, the agency would shift this quality-assurance task over to the poultry plant so that it can devote more of its employees to evaluating the company's pathogen-prevention plans and bacteria-testing programs.
"There's very few food safety defects, and a whole lot of food quality defects," said Derfler during FDLI's Food Week conference. "Basically what we're saying is that our inspectors looking at quality are doing the work of the plant. In this budgetary environment, it just doesn't make sense for government employees to do that kind of work."
Inspection personnel are being moved down the line -- to right before the chiller -- to make sure there's no fecal material on the birds, or no other food safety defects, before the birds take the plunge into the cooling bath. It will require "a whole lot less inspectors," said Derfler.
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