Industry Targets Campylobacter

UK - The fight against campylobacter in poultry is to become a major focus for the British poultry industry.

10 December 2008

3 minute read

Europe

Speaking at the British Poultry Council industry awards at the House of Commons in London, Ted Wright, the BPC chairman said that the industry will continue is work against campylobacter and will research ways of reducing it in poultry products.

"We have got to look at what cost effective measures can be put in between the farm and the fork," he said.

And he added that the industry had to look at instituting controls similar to those that have been put in place to reduce salmonella in flocks so that campylobacter does not become a major issue within the industry.

Mr Wright said that the BPC and the industry had been working closely with the Food Standards Agency to ensure that the safest possible product is being produced.

"All of us are striving to produce safe food," he said.

He said that the industry had managed to recover from concerns over avian influenza and some of the alarmist media comments that had been made.

Mr Wright welcomed the reforms that are currently being carried out in the Meat Hygiene Service and welcomed the improvements that had come through the use of Poultry meat Inspection Assistants on the slaughter line.

The chairman of the Food Standards Agency, Dame Deirdre Hutton, who was presenting the awards, echoed Mr Wright's stance in the fight against campylobacter in poultry meat.

She said that campylobacter is the biggest cause of food borne diseases that cost the industry £500 million a year.

She said that half the cases of illness through food borne pathogens come from chicken.

She added that the agency is setting a target to reduce the amount of campylobacter found in poultry meat by 50 per cent by 2010.

"We have to work in partnership with the industry," she said.

She added that they had to develop a tool that could trace and control the presence of campylobacter at the slaughterhouse.

Dame Deirdre also applauded that fact that the UK has just declared itself free from avian influenza, but she added that the industry and the country still had to be vigilant.