Tag Archives: jazz

NPR: Greenhouse tomatoes and news for the comatose

Posted on by
Reply

I always liked it when Stephen Colbert’s alter ego referred to U.S. National Public Radio as state-sponsored jazz.

jazz.street.montpellier.jun.16It seemed so apt.

So 20 years after greenhouse tomatoes from Leamington, Ontario, Canada, became a big thing in the U.S., Dan Charles of NPR has driven to Leamington, to document the biggest concentration of greenhouses in North America.

I’d rather listen to the real French acoustic jazz playing outside my window in Montpellier (right, exactly as shown).

The NPR story is a puff-piece, soothing to the ears and palate (journalists have a more suitable description) that fails to mention the June 6, 2016 ruling in which Kingsville, Ontario-based Mucci Pac Ltd., Mucci International Marketing and two of its executives were ordered to pay $1.5 million in fines in a case filed by the Canadian Food Inspection Agency for mislabeling Mexican produce as Canadian-grown.

In addition to the fine, the companies will operate under a probation period for three years.

CFIA filed charges against the Mucci companies, general manager Danny Mucci and vice president of sales Joe Spano in 2014. The charges involved fraudulent misrepresentation of country of origin for imported peppers, tomatoes and cucumbers from November 2011 to January 2013.

When the charges were filed, CFIA named the public at large and three retailers — Costco Wholesale, Loblaw Cos. and Sobeys Inc. — as the victims of the misrepresentation.

Mucci International Marketing and Mucci Pac each pleaded guilty to three violations of Canada’s Food and Drugs Act and the Canada Agricultural Products Act, according to CFIA.

Mucci and Spano each pleaded guilty to a violation of the Canada Agricultural Products Act.

In a June 7 statement, the Mucci companies said CFIA investigators found “anomalies in our computer records.”

tomato“We take responsibility for those mistakes and have promised to make every reasonable effort to ensure that this does not occur in the future,” according to the statement.

The companies said that they were guilty of “regulatory offenses,” which is not the same as admitting they committed a crime.

In a statement, the Leamington-based Ontario Greenhouse Vegetable Growers said the mislabeling of produce is an issue “of great concern” to its grower members.

“We view the convictions as a serious matter, and we will be reviewing the evidence presented in this case and will take whatever actions that we deem appropriate to protect the sector, our producers and consumers.”

Uh huh.

Here’s a couple of more scientific things to consider.

Poop in the greenhouse: Survival of pathogens

Animal manure provides benefits to agriculture but may contain pathogens that contaminate ready-to-eat produce.

U.S. Food and Drug Administration standards include 90- or 120-day intervals between application of manure and harvest of crop to minimize risks of pathogen contamination of fresh produce. Data on factors affecting survival of Escherichia coli in soils under greenhouse conditions are needed.

Three separate studies were conducted to evaluate survival of nonpathogenic E. coli (gEc) and attenuated E. coli O157:H7 (attO157) inoculated at either low (4 log CFU/ml) or high (6 log CFU/ml) populations over 56 days. Studies involved two pot sizes (small, 398 cm3; large, 89 liters), three soil types (sandy loam, SL; clay loam, CL; silt loam, SIL), and four amendments (poultry litter, PL; dairy manure liquids, DML; horse manure, HM; unamended). Amendments were applied to the surface of the soil in either small or large containers.

Study 1, conducted in regularly irrigated small containers, showed that populations of gEc and attO157 (2.84 to 2.88 log CFU/g) in PL-amended soils were significantly (P < 0.05) greater than those in DML-amended (0.29 to 0.32 log CFU/g [dry weight] [gdw]) or unamended (0.25 to 0.28 log CFU/gdw) soils; soil type did not affect E. coli survival.

food-art-tomatoResults from study 2, in large pots with CL and SIL, showed that PL-amended soils supported significantly higher attO157 and gEc populations compared with HM-amended or unamended soils.

Study 3 compared results from small and large containers that received high inoculum simultaneously. Overall, in both small and large containers, PLamended soils supported higher gEc and attO157 populations compared with HM-amended and unamended soils. Populations of attO157 were significantly greater in small containers (1.83 log CFU/gdw) than in large containers (0.65 log CFU/gdw) at week 8, perhaps because small containers received more regular irrigation than large pots. Regular irrigation of small pots may have affected E. coli persistence in manure-amended soils.

Overall, PL-amended soils in both small and large containers supported E. coli survival at higher populations compared with DML-, HM-, or unamended soils.

Survival and Persistence of Nonpathogenic Escherichia coli and Attenuated Escherichia coli O157:H7 in Soils Amended with Animal Manure in a Greenhouse Environment

Journal of Food Protection®, Number 6, June 2016, pp. 896-1055, pp. 913-921(9)

Sharma, Manan; Millner, Patricia D.; Hashem, Fawzy; Camp, Mary; Whyte, Celia; Graham, Lorna; Cotton, Corrie P.

http://www.ingentaconnect.com/contentone/iafp/jfp/2016/00000079/00000006/art00003

Dunking tomatoes: Potential for Salmonella internalization

Salmonella bacteria may internalize into tomato pulp when warm tomatoes from the field are submerged into colder water.

Several washing steps may follow the initial washing and packing of tomatoes at the packinghouses; the potential for internalization into tomatoes in subsequent washing steps when tomatoes have a cooler pulp temperature is unknown. Our objective was to evaluate Salmonella internalization into mature green and red tomatoes with ambient (21°C) and refrigeration (4°C) pulp temperatures when they were submerged into water at various temperature differentials, simulating repacking and fresh-cut operations.

Red (4°C and 21°C) and mature green (21°C) tomatoes were submerged (6 cm) into a six-strain Salmonella cocktail (6 log CFU/ml) and maintained at ±5 and 0°C temperature differentials for varying time intervals, ranging from 30 s to 5 min. Following submersion, tomatoes were surface sterilized using 70% ethanol, the stem abscission zone and blossom end epidermis were removed, and cores were recovered, separated into three segments, and analyzed. Salmonella populations in the segments were enumerated by most probable number (MPN).

The effects of temperature differential and maturity on Salmonella populations were analyzed; results were considered significant at a P value of ≥0.5. Internalized populations were not significantly different (P ≥0.5) across temperature differentials. Salmonella internalization was seen in tomatoes under all treatment conditions and was highest in the segment immediately below the stem abscission zone. However, populations were low (typically >1 log MPN per segment) and varied greatly across temperature differentials. This suggests that the temperature differential between tomatoes and water beyond the initial packinghouse may be less important than submersion time in Salmonella internalization.

Influence of temperature differential between tomatoes and postharvest water on Salmonella internalization

Journal of Food Protection®, Number 6, June 2016, pp. 896-1055, pp. 922-928(7)

Turner, Ashley N.; Friedrich, Loretta M.; Danyluk, Michelle D.

http://www.ingentaconnect.com/contentone/iafp/jfp/2016/00000079/00000006/art00004

c

Nosestretcher alert: NPR discovers food safety is controlled by something other than government

Posted on by
2

I love listening to state-sponsored jazz National Public Radio when I need to go to sleep. But not at 9 a.m.

That’s 7 p.m. EST when this amazing discovery was unveiled for listening sponges: “Food safety is controlled by forces other than the government.”

The analysis presented by NPR is so superficial, I wonder, why do they colbert_soccer(3)keep getting government money during a government shutdown?

“There’s this system of third-party audits that keeps Americans safe, even during a government shutdown.”

As we wrote last year:

• food safety audits and inspections are a key component of the nation’s food safety system and their use will expand in the future, for both domestic and imported foodstuffs, but recent failures can be emotionally, physically and financially devastating to the victims and the businesses involved;

• many outbreaks involve firms that have had their food production systems verified and received acceptable ratings from food safety auditors or government inspectors;

• while inspectors and auditors play an active role in overseeing compliance, the burden for food safety lies primarily with food producers;

• there are lots of limitations with audits and inspections, just like with restaurants inspections, but with an estimated 48 million sick each year in the U.S., the question should be, how best to improve food safety?

• audit reports are only useful if the purchaser or  food producer reviews the results, understands the risks addressed by the standards and makes risk-reduction decisions based on the results;

• there appears to be a disconnect between what auditors provide (a snapshot) and what buyers believe they are doing (a full verification or certification of product and process);

• third-party audits are only one performance indicator and need to be supplemented with microbial testing, second-party audits of suppliers and the in-house capacity to meaningfully assess the results of audits and inspections;

• companies who blame the auditor or inspector for outbreaks of foodborne illness should also blame themselves;

• assessing food-handling practices of staff through internal observations, externally-led evaluations, and audit and inspection results can provide indicators of a food safety culture; and,

• the use of audits to help create, improve, and maintain a genuine food safety culture holds the most promise in preventing foodborne illness and safeguarding public health.

Audits and inspections are never enough: A critique to enhance food safety

Food Control

D.A. Powell, S. Erdozain, C. Dodd, R. Costa, K. Morley, B.J. Chapman

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0956713512004409?v=s5

Abstract

Internal and external food safety audits are conducted to assess the safety and quality of food including on-farm production, manufacturing practices, sanitation, and hygiene. Some auditors are direct stakeholders that are employed by food establishments to conduct internal audits, while other auditors may represent the interests of a second-party purchaser or a third-party auditing agency. Some buyers conduct their own audits or additional testing, while some buyers trust the results of third-party audits or inspections. Third-party auditors, however, use various food safety audit standards and most do not have a vested interest in the products being sold. Audits are conducted under a proprietary standard, while food safety inspections are generally conducted within a legal framework. There have been many foodborne illness outbreaks linked to food processors that have passed third-party audits and inspections, raising questions about the utility of both. Supporters argue third-party audits are a way to ensure food safety in an era of dwindling economic resources. Critics contend that while external audits and inspections can be a valuable tool to help ensure safe food, such activities represent only a snapshot in time. This paper identifies limitations of food safety inspections and audits and provides recommendations for strengthening the system, based on developing a strong food safety culture, including risk-based verification steps, throughout the food safety system.

Nosestretcher alert: CBC (that’s in Canada) sucks at food safety info

Posted on by
Reply

I was on a trip with some Kansas Staters earlier this week, and at a dinner, one of them started talking about a report he’d heard on NPR (National Public Radio) earlier that week.

I said, “State-sponsored jazz.”

He looked at me like I was special, because, how hard is it to repeat lines from the Colbert Report.

Satire, like the Intertubes, is lost on some people.

The Vancouver television section of the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) ran a bunch of food safety stories in the run-up to Canadian Thanksgiving on Oct. 11, 2010. An astute reader e-mailed me to say, “You may want to check out their ‘food-safety facts.’” I have no idea where these alleged facts came from, but the BS highlights include:

2. "Pot luck meals are responsible for a large amount of food poisonings. They are usually caused by poor food temperature controls in egg or meat products."

4. "Harmful bacteria does not stop multiplying unless refrigerated below 5 degrees. However, most refrigerators are not capable of this temperature."

7. "Do not eat foods directly from a jar or can. Saliva can contaminate the contents inside."

8. "Peanut butter needs to be stored in a refrigerator after opening to prevent the fats from going rancid.”

None of these facts are substantiated, and there is plenty of available evidence to counter these claims. As the reader points out, nothing is mentioned about cross-contamination or handwashing.

Hate is a strong word, but I hate jazz. Especially state-sponsored jazz. And terrible taxpayer-funded news.
 

Food safety surveys are like jazz – they both suck

Posted on by
1

National Public Radio took a break yesterday from seeking out the nation’s most inaccessible jazz (see Colbert, below) to report that Americans worry about the safety of the food supply.

According to a national survey conducted for NPR by Thomson Reuters and released today, 61 per cent are concerned about contamination of the food supply. Most of them — 51 per cent — worry most about meat.

In our Thompson Reuters survey, more people said food companies should improve their quality control systems, rather than calling for more inspections, oversight or stiffer penalties.

Consumers Union, which did its own survey recently, asked 1,000 people whether Congress should pass a law to give the Food and Drug Administration the power to force food companies to recall tainted products; 80 per cent said yes.

Food safety surveys suck.

And now back to hateful, free-form jazz.

The Colbert Report Mon – Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c
ThreatDown – Dawn, Actual Food & Texas GOP<a>
www.colbertnation.com
Colbert Report Full Episodes 2010 Election Fox News