September 29, 2006

 

Audit may crush export hopes of US state-inspected plants
 

 

The drive in Congress to allow state-inspected meat plants to export out of state suffered a setback Thursday as an audit by the Agriculture Department's inspector general made public Thursday (Sep 28) revealed glaring food-safety faults that might scuttle the effort.

 

State-inspected meat plants were allowed to operate despite soot-like material on pig carcasses and old meat residues on cutting boards, the report said.

 

The findings comes as Congress is considering a proposal to let state-inspected plants sell meat anywhere in the United States, Macon, a paper in Georgia reported.

 

Current rules only allow the federally inspected plants to ship meat across state lines or to foreign countries but not state-inspected ones. 

 

Auditors noted violations at Mississippi plants in 2003 included soot-like material found on several swine carcasses and scored and stained cutting boards with product residues from previous operations.

 

There were also problems in plants in four other states - Missouri, Wisconsin, Delaware and Minnesota.

 

While the state would assign an inspector to each of these facilities, the report said, it could not provide short-term coverage in special circumstances such as when those inspectors were absent due to illnesses or vacations.

 

Barbara Masters, administrator of the department's Food Safety and Inspection Service, pointed out the reports were done in 2003 and the department has since strengthened its system of reviewing such inspections.

 

The audit drew criticism from a food safety advocacy group, Consumer Federation of America, which said people were placed at risk through such violations.

 

However, The National Association of State Departments of Agriculture said state plants meet or exceed federal rules.

 

The department said the state inspection programme was "at least equal to" the federal inspection programme. If the department decides a state programme is lacking, it can take control of inspections at state plants.

 

A spokesman for the state agriculture officials' group, Charlie Ingram, also defended state inspections, saying the process gave plants the opportunity to fix problems.

 

Many state inspected plants have requirements that are stricter than USDA requirements, Ingram said, adding there has never been a documented foodborne illness from state-inspected meat and poultry.

 

The group has been lobbying Congress to allow interstate shipment of state-inspected meat. State-approved meat processing plants have long hoped for the chance to export their products out of state. Many do not produce enough volume to export to other countries profitably or could not afford to provide inspectors on site every day as those in federally inspected plants do.