The USDA's FSIS Announces Effective Date for Meat Grind Ruling

On December 14, 2015, the Food Safety and Inspection service (FSIS) announced it is amending its record keeping regulations to require that all official establishments and retail stores that grind raw beef products for sale maintain detailed records*. The effective date will be June 20, 2016.

The detailed records must include:

• The establishment numbers of establishments supplying material used to prepare each lot of raw ground beef product.
• All supplier lot numbers and production dates.
• The names of the supplied materials, including beef components and any materials carried over from one production lot to the next.
• The date and time each lot of raw ground beef product is produced.
• The date and time when grinding equipment and other related food-contact surfaces are cleaned and sanitized.

Applied Data Corporation (ADC) has been providing retailers with grind traceability solutions for over 5 years with their Meat Grind Traceability Management module, which is an electronic, automated system that captures and records source materials through the meat grind process, providing the information that both retailers and regulatory agencies need to quickly and effectively identify potential source materials that could cause or contribute to an outbreak, at any time.

ADC’s Meat Grind Traceability Management module is installed at a retailer's headquarters or hosted in the cloud and features an easy-to-use browser user interface that enables retailers to quickly implement the software with little investment in additional hardware. The software captures all of the required information from the primal’s barcode with wireless handheld devices.

To learn more about the proposed regulation or ADC’s software solution, please contact our office at +1.813.849.1818 or visit www.AppliedDataCorp.com.

*Read the complete final rule here.

Proposed Meat Grind Traceability Regulation Could Be Law As Soon As Early 2015

On July 16, 2014 the USDA's Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) proposed a regulation to require retail stores to keep records containing information on the suppliers of source materials used in the meat grind production process*. Industry sources predict the rule could become law as soon as early 2015 and be enforced as soon as late 2015.

Applied Data Corporation (ADC) has been providing retailers with grind traceability solutions for over 5 years with their Meat Grind Traceability Management module and has been following the proposed regulation very closely.

On October 21, 2014, ADC submitted official comments to the proposed regulation**.  These comments were to provide FSIS with information on current solutions available to meet the regulation, as well as to identify requirements in the regulation that would put an unnecessary burden on retailers.

In their comments, ADC emphasized that FSIS should explicitly accommodate the use of electronic recordkeeping for meat grind traceability data because such solutions are already being used by retailers across the country and meet the requirements of the proposed regulation.   

ADC’s Meat Grind Traceability Management module is an electronic, automated system that captures and records source materials through the meat grind process, providing the information that both retailers and regulatory agencies need to quickly and effectively identify potential source materials that could cause or contribute to an outbreak, at any time.

The Meat Grind Traceability Management module is installed at a retailer's headquarters and features an easy-to-use browser user interface that enables retailers to quickly implement the software with little investment in additional hardware.  The software captures all of the required information from the primal’s barcode with wireless handheld devices.

*Read about the proposed regulation here.
**Read ADC’s comments on the proposed regulation here.

USDA Confirms Mad Cow Disease in California

The headlining store of today’s Supermarket News Daily News Update announced a confirmed case of Mad Cow Disease in a dairy cow in California (full article can be found here: http://bit.ly/IbmQiD).  According to a more detailed article published by Food Safety News (full article can be found here http://bit.ly/Jnz4Cs), the animal never presented a risk to the food supply or human health.  However, that won’t stop shopper’s from worrying. 

For grocery stores, it is always better to be prepared for unexpected recalls in their meat departments.  One way to be sure that you have the necessary recall procedures in place is to have meat traceability applications available to your stores.  ADC’s Meat Grind Traceability Manager provides the necessary reporting and tracing capabilities, so that recalls don’t catch a grocer by surprise.  

The Meat Grind Traceability Manager module (a part of the P-Cubed Production Manager Software) is designed to help grocery stores meet USDA Food Safety and Inspection Services (FSIS) rules and regulations.  The module offers traceability and data-logging protection to companies in the case of a ground meat contamination.

The Meat Grind Traceability Manager software module provides a record for all meat that is ground in a meat department. By scanning and recording the different supplies of ground meat, accurate labels are generated to provide easy traceability and reporting to stores if and when a contamination occurs.

In addition to saving time and money compared to manual paper-based tracking systems, the Meat Grind Management Traceability software allows companies to quickly and accurately respond to recalls when they happen. Centrally logging records of every lug of meat that is ground allows for reports to be pulled with ease and can ensure grocery stores are in compliance with FSIS Directives.

With ADC's Meat Grind Traceability Manager, meat cutters can scan the barcodes on primals to record the name of the supplying establishment(s), supplier lot number(s), production date and name of supplied material(s). This information is embedded into the GS1-128 bar-code that is on each label. Therefore, when a contamination occurs, grocery stores can quickly pull the P-Cubed Grinding Log Report to assess what portion of their meat is part of the recall.

To learn more, contact ADC at +1.813.849.1818, or visit our website, www.AppliedDataCorp.com, for more information.  Click here to contact ADC today.