NOTE: Click on the links in this article to view examples of the type of information held in the FoodlineWeb databases.

Advances in food safety management

Delivering safe and wholesome products to the consumer is the aim of all food producers, from small specialist enterprises to large multinational companies. In order to achieve this goal considerable attention is paid to all aspects of safety, from microbiological contamination and/or growth to the presence of physical or chemical contaminants and the control of allergens. The use of HACCP plans backed up by factory or laboratory based testing, as appropriate, help to achieve the goal of safe food. Ensuring authenticity of ingredients is also key, although adulteration or mis-description of a product may be limited to fraud, for example substitution of a premium product with a cheaper one. On occasion a genuine product has been substituted with non-food substances, with resulting food safety implications as occurred with melamine in milk in 2008 and the Sudan dye recalls between 2003 and 2005.

Traceability

Leatherhead’s Members-only Food Safety Day on 29 September will focus on food traceability. A good traceability system can be crucial in both preventing food safety incidents and in managing problems when they do occur. A variety of systems and guidelines are in place to aid the traceability of foods and food products. Our Keynote Speaker, Steve Hessey from Bakkavor Group, will describe some of these and give examples of how they work in practice.

Identifying potential problems before they occur, so that they can be pre-empted by appropriate action, would be very beneficial. Phillip Randalls will discuss the tools that the Food Standards Agency is developing to aid horizon scanning and so identify and reduce the impact of new and re-emerging risks.

Developments in scientific analysis can often be usefully applied to the food industry, for example, recent advances in genetic analyses, improvements to analytical equipment UPLC versus HPLC, increased performance of mass spectrometry and use of array technology. Illustrating these developments, there will be presentations on the use of genetic analyses to trace pathogenic or anti-microbial resistance traits in microorganisms in the food chain whist Dr Simon Kelly of IFR will show how molecular isotope ratios are used to determine the place of origin of a food. Leatherhead’s Nutrition Laboratory Manager, Antony Bagshaw, will review aspects of chemical analysis in the food industry and Dr Peter Wareing, Leatherhead’s Food Safety Advisor, will talk about the various rapid method tests available for use by industry.

New technologies can be applied to make traceability more accessible, for example, the use of radio frequency identification (RFID) tagging systems. Niels Peter Baadsgaard from the Danish Agriculture & Food Council will discuss the ‘PigTracker’ project which has developed electronic ear tags for the unique identification and tracking of pigs in the Danish production system. The technology has the potential to be applied to other species such as cattle and sheep.

Leatherhead Forum Research

Leatherhead expert Dr Angus Knight will discuss the challenges in determining the conditions required for the inactivation of Noroviruses, a leading cause of gastroenteritis. As with all pathogens, inactivation procedures will only be effective if they are based on appropriate scientific information, sometimes not easy to obtain. In addition, I will outline Leatherhead’s research on allergens and risk assessment. Other results from current Food Safety Forum projects carried out by Leatherhead Food Research scientists will be available as poster presentations.

Food Safety Day is free to Members – to see the full programme and to register to attend, please visit www.leatherheadfood.com/forumdays2010.

We look forward to seeing you on 29 September.

Dr Joanna Topping, Senior Research Scientist, Food Safety Research

To find out more about how Leatherhead’s Food Safety portfolio can help your company, please visit www.leatherheadfood.com/food-safety or contact Dr Evangelia Komitopoulou, Head of Food Safety, on T: +44 (0)1372 822222, E: ekomitopoulou@leatherheadfood.com

ROADSHOWS

Leatherhead will be hosting two free events, the first in Manchester on 9 September and the second in Amsterdam on 19 October. Open to both Members and non-members, the days will be themed around the topic of Clean Labels and provide delegates with key insights into this constantly evolving area of the food and drink industry.