Microbiological criteria

Thursday 26 January 2006

See details on Microbiological criteria for the Meat Industry.

A Chapter on the Microbiological Criteria Regulations will shortly be added to PART THREE of the Guide to Food Hygiene and Other Regulations for the Meat Industry when added end January.

New EU Microbiological Criteria Regulations apply to food of animal origin from 1 January 2006. They include carcase testing requirements that replace the ones in the Meat (HACCP) Regulations 2002, including new criteria for Salmonella for red meat and poultry carcases.

For slaughterhouses the regulations set out process hygiene criteria that should be used to ensure the production processes are operating properly, specifically:
For red meat slaughterhouses:

• Aerobic colony count (also known as Total Viable Count (TVC)) and Enterobacteriaceae on cattle, sheep, goats, horses and pig carcases and
• Salmonella on cattle, sheep, goats, horses, pig carcases

For poultry slaughterhouses:

• Salmonella on broiler and turkey carcases