Salmonella in Poultry Meat: Challenges in Food Safety and demands in the international trade

The poultry industry is one of the most important sectors of the Brazilian agribusiness. In addition of being extremely important for economy due to the billions of dollars generated by exports, the poultry industry has a very relevant social role as it employs thousands of people all over the country. Global exports of chicken meat increased 11.4% in 2007, with 7.2 million metric tons (MT). Brazil had a 45% share in this international market, maintaining its positions as the greatest world exporter of chicken meat.

During the period of 1984 to 2007, chicken meat per capita consumption in Brazil increased from 7 kg to 38.2 kg. In addition to this significant growth of the domestic market, the expansion of production has led Brazil to increase its share in the foreign market. Chicken meat exports started in 1975, with about 3,500 MT, reached in 2007 the impressive volume of 3.2 million MT, representing an increase of more than 91,000% and revenues of almost USD 5 billion. Despite the increasing share in the international market, the supply of chicken meat to the domestic market is still plenty (ABEF - Associação Brasileira dos Exportadores de Frango, 2007). 

According to the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), global production of chicken meat increased 6.2% in 2007, from 64 to 68 million MT. Brazilian production in 2007 was 10.2 million MT, maintaining the country in the position of third largest world producer, following the USA and China, which produced 16.2 and 11.5 million MT, respectively. ABEF reported that the exports of chicken meat cuts summed up 1.8 million MT with revenues of USD 2.7 billion in 2007.

The main Brazilian chicken cuts markets are Asia (particularly Japan and Hong Kong) and the European Union (mainly the Netherlands and Germany). The exports of whole chickens amounted to 1.1 million MT, with revenues of USD 1.4 billion, and are mostly directed to the Middle East (mainly to Saudi Arabia, Arab Emirates, Yemen, and Kuwait) as well as to Venezuela, Russia and Angola.

Between January and October of 2008, Brazilian chicken exports reached 3.1 million MT, representing a 17% increase compared with the same period in 2007 (during those 10 months of 2008, revenues totaled USD 6 billion or a 54% increase compared with 2007) (ABEF, 2008). In order to process most of its poultry production, Brazil currently has 184 processing plants with federal inspection services.

As mentioned above, it must be highlighted the poultry production chain has acquired increasing social and economic importance in Brazil. Taking the specific case of broiler production in the state of Rio Grande do Sul (RS), in 2004 the number of contracted farmers was 10,500 with more than 13,000 broiler houses distributed in 134 counties. Broilers are produced mainly in small farms and are an excellent alternative for production diversification (ASGAV, 2005a,b). In Brazil, UBA data (2007) indicate a number of 4 million Jobs linked to poultry production, with obvious social consequences. Because poultry production adopts associativist or contract systems, it allows farmers to retain their properties as it makes small farms economically feasible by providing working capital and technology and by ensuring the sales of their flocks. In the state of Rio Grande do Sul, there are about 40,000 families – mostly small-farm owners – directly linked to broiler and egg production, which generate 45,000 direct and 800,000 indirect job posts. Poultry production also contributes to improve soil physical and chemical qualities, as a considerable volume of organic fertilizer is added to crops in small farms, increasing the production of crops. In addition, cooperatives and poultry companies provide the farmers with cutting-edge genetic, nutrition and health technologies. Another important aspect is that poultry production supplies an affordable food source for low-income populations.

When considering the current global scenario, together with the remarkable progress in technology, there is a growing public concern with food quality and safety. This concern is evident not only in the so-called developed countries, but also those still developing as a result both of the improvement of the social and economic conditions of their populations and of the expansion of the access to information (CAC, 2001).

For decades, food microbiological safety was exclusively based on complying with preestablished microbiological standards and criteria. This required food safety surveillance agencies and food companies to conduct microbiological analyses to determine the compliance with those criteria and standards, and therefore, if products were safe for human consumption. However, it was soon perceived that those analyses were limited as tools to ensure food safety, particularly when there are low contamination levels. For instance, when there is one contaminated unit in a batch of 200 food products (0.5%), even if 100 units are analyzed, the probability of mistakenly approve the batch is 61% (ICMSF, 2002). In addition to sampling method and size, there are other issues involved, such as method of analysis, microbiological limits of each pathogen, and microbial ecology in the product. Microbiological standards and criteria can be applied to finished products, but make little or no contribution to solve contamination issues in the processing line (REIJ & SCHOTHORST, 2000).

The international trade of food is growing, bringing economic and social benefits. Also feedings habits have changed in many countries during the last two decades, inspiring the development of new food production, preparation, and distribution techniques (CAC, 2001). This has required a pro-active attitude from food producers, using other tools to ensure food safety.

One of these tools is the HACCP system (Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Points) applied to food processing lines. However, its efficacy requires the previous implementation of good hygiene practices (WHITING & UCHANAN, 1997). The main focus of the HACCP system is to identify and control process steps that influence the production of safe food. This system has proven to be very effective for the control of physical, chemical, and biological hazards in foods. However, one of its main disadvantages is that it is difficult to compare different HACCP plans as it is not possible to assess if they provide the same level of protection to the final consumer (ICMSF, 1998; ICMSF, 2002).

The existence of these limitations, together with the need of properly estimating potential food safety impacts on public health as well as the economic costs associated to foodborne diseases, resulted in the development of this new safety management tool called Risk Analysis (WHITING & BUCHANAN, 1997). The concept of microbiological risk analysis has been increasingly accepted for the management of microbiological hazards in food. A risk analysis is a structured and systematic process that integrates information from several sources on the origin and destruction of pathogens along the production chain and that determines the magnitude of public health risks (LAMMERDING, 2006).

According to the internationally accepted concept, the Risk Analysis process consists of three components: Risk Assessment, Risk Management, and Risk Communication (CAC, 1999; ICMSF, 2002; SCHLUNDT, 2002), as shown in Figure 1.