A retired USDA meat inspector “is joining forces with critics who say that a trial high-speed hog processing system piloted by USDA is a food safety nightmare,” reports Food Safety News. Under the so-called HACCP Inspection Models Project, used at five hog plants, inspectors put more emphasis on preventing contamination of meat and the processors bear more responsibility for sorting healthy hogs for slaughter.
Processing lines can run roughly 20-percent faster than plants with the traditional “poke and sniff” USDA inspection. “In my opinion, the only standards they were concerned about meeting were the standards that the company had for production,” retired inspector Joe Ferguson told FSN. Ferguson was assigned to a Quality Pork Processors plant accused of mistreating hogs. The company, a supplier to Hormel, says it is undertaking corrective measures in response to the charges.
The consumer group Government Accountability Project, which is working with Ferguson and at least one other retired inspector, says that carcasses speed down the processing line so rapidly it’s difficult to spot abscesses, lesions or fecal matter that could make meat contaminated. Nor can employees slow down the line without fear of retaliation, it said.