 The following is a production of New Mexico State University. Congratulations! As the owner of a new meter poultry slaughter processing plant, you're entering into a new and exciting endeavor, one that is both challenging and rewarding. Challenging because as you will learn in this video, there are many things that you'll need to know. You'll learn about sanitation standard operating procedures, and you'll also learn about hazard analysis, critical control points, or hazard. It's going to be rewarding. Rewarding because when you produce a safe product, you're helping protect the American public, and you're building your business. But you don't need to feel like you're in this alone. My name is Mary Kutchall, and I'm with the United States Department of Agriculture, specifically the Food Safety and Inspection Service. We're the agency responsible for overseeing and verifying that all meat, poultry, and processed egg products are wholesome, properly labeled, and unadulterated. You heard me mention earlier, HACCP. When the Food Safety Inspection Service, or FSIS, decided to adopt the Pathogen Reduction HACCP rules back in 1997, we knew that small and very small plants faced unique challenges. At the time, we began providing guidance and assistance, specifically designed to help these plants comply with regulations. And remember, whether you're under federal or state inspection, the same rules apply. The materials that we began developing then, and the network that we put in place to assist you continue today. In fact, they've grown even stronger. My staff, the Strategic Initiatives, Partnerships and Outreach staff, part of our Office of Public Affairs Education and Outreach, take this charge and this responsibility to heart. This video is only one example. We have numerous materials to assist you, and I'm sure that when you view this video, you'll also want to receive a copy of our brochure. It details all the outreach materials available to you. Please make use of them. We sincerely want you to succeed in producing the best and safest product that you can. Wholesome, unadulterated food benefits us all. There's nothing more basic to the public health than a safe food supply. We're pleased that we can partner with you to make this a reality for all Americans. Protecting the nation's food supply through food safety and security is our mission, and we want to thank you for being a part of this. Thanks, Mary. I am Art Marquez with the New Mexico Livestock Ward meat and poultry inspection program. We are here to protect the public health and also to assist your business in producing the safest possible product. As a state director of one of the many states with meat inspection programs like ours, I am excited to join USDA FSIS in this partnership. Now, let's go visit a new plant that's having their first meeting with their inspector. My name is Gilbert Zamora. I'm with the New Mexico Livestock Ward meat inspection division. Welcome to the meat and poultry business. Believe it or not, an inspector's purpose is to help make your business a success by providing guidance on producing safe food. Al Guerrero has been in the meat processing business for 40 years. At first, you know, it was hard to deal with because you're so set on your ways. Once the inspectors came in, you had to change quite a bit. Well, at first, you kind of feel kind of hostile, you know, but they're trying to tell you what it's your business and they're trying to tell you what to do. Now, it's, I mean, it's a good relationship as far as, you know, as far as I'm concerned. Since they're here all day, you know, part of the day, almost every day, you know, like they're part of the crew. We're doing something wrong, they can correct us. One key to that good relationship is good communication, which includes designating both a primary contact person with the authority to make important decisions and a secondary contact person to cover as needed. In this case, Al's grandson, Anthony. Fortunately, food processors don't have to guess what's expected of them. All the basics from development to implementation to maintenance have been clearly established in two detailed regulatory plans. The SSOPs, Sanitation Standard Operating Procedures, and your own Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Points, or HACCP plan. Followed faithfully, these two plans help guarantee a safe and wholesome product. Your daily responsibilities begin with the daily pre-operational inspection conducted after the previous shift's cleanup is done and before the next shift begins. A designated employee, usually the owner or manager, conducts the inspection and completes the pre-op reports. This inspection covers the facility, the equipment, and the employees. The safety of your product is everyone's main goal. So whenever an inspector arrives at your facility, you must be allowed to finish your pre-op inspection. Then your plant must allow time for the inspector to conduct a pre-op inspection. So processing should not begin before the official hours of operation. If you want to work outside your usual hours of operation, you must notify your inspector in advance. The only exception would be the preparation of retail or custom product, such as small game hunts. But the FSIS, or your state inspector, will still provide oversight on sanitary conditions. And remember, in addition to their routine daily visits, inspectors can work odd hours too, conducting random testing, taking samples of product, and applying hygienic product contact surface swabs to check for salmonella, E. coli, and or listeria. In this case, green means clean. So conducting a thorough routine self-inspection pays off. If you locate a problem before the inspector does, for example, a piece of equipment that hasn't been cleaned properly, he will not issue a non-compliance record, or NR, but if the inspector finds something you missed, he could issue you an NR. If an inspector does issue a non-compliance record, he will give you two copies of the NR. Once you have corrected the problem, first explain in writing on the NR what action you took and what you plan to do to prevent a recurrence. Then return both copies to the inspector. He'll sign off, verifying you corrected the problem, then give you back one copy of the NR and keep the other for his records. Occasionally, an inspector must apply a reject retain tag. The tag can be placed on a piece of equipment, an area, a portion of a lot, or an entire lot of product. When this action is necessary, the inspector will immediately inform the establishment's contact person. Until the non-compliance is corrected, the affected equipment, area, or product cannot be used or processed, and the tag may not be removed by anyone other than the inspector under penalty of law. Even if the inspector leaves the premises, the tag remains in effect until the problem is resolved and the tag is removed by the inspector. Only then can operations proceed. A thorough pre-op inspection will detect and make note of anything that needs attention, including previous days product or soap residue, equipment in need of maintenance or repair, and problems with employee hygiene. If a facility operates with two shifts or does not have a refrigerated processing area, the second daily operational inspection should be conducted and a checklist completed after the shift change and mandatory midday cleanup. Responsible employees recognize meat processing rooms as sacred areas and consistently practice common sense and habits which promote food safety. Before entering the work area, employees must cover or remove anything on their person that might contaminate the product, hair, buttons, jewelry, or other foreign objects or substances. The basic checklist includes no nail polish of any kind, no exceptions, no jewelry in the processing area, including exposed body piercings, proper attire for the work area includes a clean apron or smock and an improved head covering. A clean baseball style hat is acceptable but must be replaced once it's dirty and a hair net is still the best and most hygienic choice. Eating, drinking and use of tobacco in any form are never permitted in the work area and of course, throw hand washing with an approved soap is critical whenever entering the processing area after using the restroom and in between working with raw and cooked product or different species of product. In the processing area, food handlers must use disposable towels to prevent cross contamination of product. Like clean hands, clean work surfaces, equipment and tools are also critical. Chemicals used to clean and sanitize the processing or slaughter area and any pesticides used within the facility must be used and stored in a way that prevents contact with and contamination of the product. For each employee's daily routine, the SSOPs and Common Sense are the keys to food handling safety. For your overall business, your HASAP plan is the key to a successful day-to-day operation. As you know, HASAP stands for Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Points. This seven-step program was developed in the 1960s by the Pillsbury Company and NASA as part of the space program to guarantee safe foods for the astronauts. Since then, HASAP has proven invaluable in the food processing industry, helping both large and small businesses prevent problems and catch mistakes before they happen. To review, your HASAP plan was created by your own HASAP team. First, they listed your customers and mapped the distribution conditions of your products, making a note of any special considerations each customer might have. Then they listed the ingredients of your products and produced and verified a flow chart or step-by-step description of all processes involved in production, starting with buying your meat products from an improved source, either a state or federally inspected establishment. This means no downers have been included in the slaughter and the carcasses have been processed using sanitary dressing procedures and interventions to assure that E. coli zero tolerance requirements and assessment for 0157H7 controls are in place. This includes guaranteeing all hair has been trimmed and all traces of fecal matter are washed away with elactic acid vinegar solution. When your facility receives frozen product, make sure it's at zero degrees Fahrenheit. If it's supposed to be chilled, make sure the temperature is below 40 degrees. Maintain those cold temperatures while you store the meat and never leave raw meat unrefrigerated for more than two hours. Non-meat items and cleaning products must be food grade or approved for use in food processing and may be purchased from any source which will sign a letter of guarantee. Your inspector can provide a sample letter for your reference. With the preliminary steps completed, your HACCP team then developed your HACCP plan using seven steps. First, they analyze all potential hazards in your production process, including biological, chemical and physical hazards. This includes a rigorous decision-making process and compiling the documentation, scientific, historical, etc. to support these decisions. It also includes identifying the specific pathogen, residue or other physical hazard of concern. Second, they identified critical control points, key steps in the process when a product can be compromised if not handled correctly. Third, they establish critical limits. Clear black and white rules for what is acceptable and what is not, such as specific time and temperature combination or other measurable limits. Fourth, they establish monitoring procedures, ways to tell whether a product meets the critical limits. This step includes verifying periodically that your instruments are working correctly so employees record accurate information. Fifth, they establish procedures for corrective action. So should a problem occur, everyone in the operation knows exactly what procedure to follow to safely resume production. For example, if product is dropped on the floor, your HACCP plan provides a written description of the corrective procedure. Washing, trimming, disposal or whatever action should be known and practiced automatically by all plant personnel. The plan also addresses ways to prevent recurrence of the problem. Sixth, they establish record keeping procedures to track daily operations and document every detail of the safe production of your product. And seventh, they establish verification procedures to make sure your HACCP plan is effective. Verification is your responsibility, but routine visits by regulatory inspector do help to ensure the safety of your product. Now that we're in it, it is real something. You know, at first it is complicated, especially with HACCP. There's so much that they require and at first it looks like it's real complicated but once you go through the procedures it's nothing that you haven't done before. And it's simple, man. After all that effort to create a full-proof comprehensive HACCP plan it's still only effective when followed. Routine monitoring in accurate logs of times, temperatures and other important details are critical. Here are some examples of some common mistakes which following your HACCP plan will help you avoid. When grinding meat products, possible hazards include mixing old and new product or different types of product. To control the hazards and prevent cross-contamination process only one day's batch code at a time and always clean the grinding equipment and grinding area between different types of product. When preparing tamales, burritos and other cooked products the possible hazards include undercooking and not cooling the product quickly enough. To control the hazards be sure to take the internal temperature with a probe thermometer and in more than one place you know the cold zones of your cooker or smokehouse. And when cooling spread the cooked product in a single layer on a shallow tray. This allows cold air to circulate around the product and speed cooling time. Be sure to monitor the cooling process and of course clean preparation areas between batches of different kinds of product to prevent post-processing contamination and listeria. When preparing jerky products hazards involve acidity, temperature, time and moisture content. To control the hazards check the pH of your marinade to make sure it is 4.6 or lower. Keep marinating jerky below 40 degrees Fahrenheit. When cooking make sure that within three hours the meat reaches at least 145 degrees Fahrenheit internally. 160 degrees is even better. Some ovens can bring the marinated meat to a safe temperature in under 15 minutes. Make sure the meat is dried to a water activity below 0.85. And prevent cross-contamination of the product during different stages of processing by observing strict sanitation procedures. Cross-contamination can occur between raw and cooked product in areas of operation by people or equipment and especially by preparation surfaces after the product is cooked. The final step in following your hassle plan is the pre-shipment review conducted at any time between packing and shipment of a product. This final check of all hassle records for that specific product is the culmination of your monitoring, verification and record keeping procedures. Failure to conduct the pre-shipment review is cause for the inspector to question the shipment. All inspected establishments with ready to eat hassle plans need to implement a Listeria Monocytogenes program as one of the tools to make sure Listeria does not enter the plant. After following all aspects of the SSOP and your hassle plan, your establishment is now ready to sell both wholesale and retail and may deliver product anywhere within the state of New Mexico. Sales outside the state, however, require federal inspection. So just like any other successful business, a meat processing operation requires that you do your homework and you have a solid plan in place. Learn it first. Know all the rules and regulations and everything of those things. So basically that's the way it is. It's a simple, safe process to make a safe product. The preceding was a production of New Mexico State University. The views and opinions in this program are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the views and opinions of the NMSU Board of Regents.