Assessing the effectiveness of a carcase hot water decontamination cabinet in small stock processing

The United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) Food Safety and Inspection Service applies a zero tolerance policy for contamination on meat by faeces, ingesta and milk. Recent history with rejections of consignments from findings of zero tolerance on sheep and goat carcasses and six-way cut pieces at port of entry inspection in the US has highlighted the challenge in consistently meeting this policy standard in these categories of products.

The key objective of this project was the trialing of a hot water spray wash cabinet at a single slaughtering establishment to determine its effectiveness in the removal of visual defects from the surface of sheep and goat carcasses under normal commercial operating conditions.