SEMA_________________________________

SOUTHEASTERN MEAT ASSOCIATION
P.O. Box 620777; Oviedo, FL 32762 Phone: 407-365-5661

Meet SEMA Director

Brian Sapp

Brian Sapp has managed White Oak Pastures, a beef processing plant in Bluffton Ga., since graduating with a BS in Food and Resource Economics.  With little experience in management, Brian’s job has been ever changing as the business grows and his tasks have included cattle procurement, human resource management, customer service, food safety management, invoicing and billing, business growth and projections, as well as being the onsite mechanic for the meat processing equipment. Brian has recently been tasked with blue-printing and contracting for the new poultry processing plant that is now under construction.

Facts up Front

The Food Marketing Institute (FMI) and the Grocery Manufacturers Association (GMA) revealed the voluntary front-of-pack nutrition system, Nutrition Keys, was renamed Facts Up Front. The groups have launched a website, www.FactsUpFront.org. that will also serve as the theme for the consumer education campaign that will be launched in early 2012.

Participating food and beverage companies will place the icons on the front of products to highlight nutrition information, including calories, saturated fat, sodium and sugar per serving, in an easy-to-understand format. The labels aim to help busy consumers make better nutrition decisions while shopping.

IRS ends Taxes on some Work-Provided Cell Phones

The Internal Revenue Service has decided companies that provide cell phones to workers no longer have to include the device as part of the employee's wages, as long as the phone was provided for "non-compensatory business reasons".

NMA-NAMP Merger Possible?

The NMA Board is in favor of merging NMA and NAMP, but the NAMP Board has decided to continue to explore the possibility as well as the benefits of a merger and has not voted on a merger at this time.

Wholesale Pork Reporting

The USDA, AMS, LS, Livestock & Grain Market News Division have provided an update on the progress of the proposed rule from the Wholesale Pork Reporting Negotiated Rulemaking Committee.  In August, the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) declared the action “significant”— requiring a cost-benefit analysis, the development of alternative regulatory approaches, and broader consideration of the rule’s potential economic impact on small business entities.  Actions determined to be “significant” also require additional Departmental clearances.  As you may recall, the Mandatory Price Reporting Act of 2010 directed USDA to promulgate a final rule “not later than 1 ½ years after the date of the enactment of [the] Act”, or March 2012.

A copy of the final report Agriculture Marketing Service (AMS) received from the facilitators for the Wholesale Pork Reporting Negotiated Rulemaking Committee will also be posted at www.ams.usda.gov/NegotiatedRulemaking.

FSIS Publishes Notice on Hazard Assessment For Pork BBQ with Vinegar and Pepper-Based Sauce

The U.S. Department of Agriculture's (USDA) Food Safety Inspection Service (FSIS) is asking inspection program personnel to ensure that facilities producing pork barbecue with vinegar and pepper-based sauce determine whether they have evaluated the safety of ingredients added after the lethality step.  According to FSIS Notice 48-11, an analysis of FSIS testing data from 2005 to 2010 shows that 23% of Salmonella positive samples from ready-to-eat (RTE) meat and poultry products are from pork barbecue with vinegar and pepper-based sauce.  The notice states that "although there have been no known illnesses linked to these products, the high rate of positive results for pork barbecue with vinegar and pepper-based sauce is of concern to the Agency."  FSIS states that the source of the Salmonella is not clear, however, FSIS says it may have come from the addition of contaminated ingredients (such as the pepper) to the sauce, or from cross-contamination of the product or sauce in the post lethality processing environment.  FSIS issued a directive in January for inspectors to ensure meat and poultry manufacturers producing RTE products do not assume that spices and other ingredients are ready to eat and free from pathogens. In both notices, FSIS is asking producers to review their HACCP plans.

USDA Announces Webinars for Nutritional Labeling

On December 29, 2010, FSIS published a final rule on nutrition labeling of single ingredient meat and poultry products and ground or chopped meat and poultry products.  The rule takes effect on January 1, 2012.

FSIS will host a series of webinars to provide guidance on meeting the requirements of the new regulations.  The first webinar was held Sept. 14th.  Subsequent webinars will be held at 2 pm ET on October 12, November 8, and December 13. To access the webinars, log onto: https://connect16.uc.att.com/usda/meet/?ExEventID=85277207 and follow the onscreen instructions.

For questions and information regarding the webinars, or if you have a problem accessing the webinar, please contact Kristin Goodwin at 301-504-0878.  If you prefer, you may email her at Kristin.Goodwin@fsis.usda.gov.

USDA Takes New Steps to Fight E. Coli

The U.S. Department of Agriculture announced it is taking new steps to fight E. coli and protect the safety of the American food supply.  Six additional serogroups of pathogenic E. coli will be declared adulterants in non-intact raw beef.  Raw ground beef, its components, and tenderized steaks found to contain these bacteria will be prohibited from sale to consumers.  USDA's Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) will launch a testing program to detect these dangerous pathogens and prevent them from reaching consumers.

If the E. coli serogroups O26, O103, O45, O111, O121, and O145 are found in raw ground beef or its precursors, those products will be prohibited from entering commerce.  Like E.coli O157:H7, these serogroups can cause severe illness and even death, and young children and the elderly are at highest risk.  The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention identifies these particular serogroups of non-O157:H7 Shiga-toxin producing E.coli, or non-O157 STEC, as those responsible for the greatest numbers of non-O157 STEC illnesses, hospitalizations, and deaths in the United States.

FSIS will begin testing for these six serogroups of STEC and enforcing the new policy on March 5, 2012.  The Agency invites interested persons to submit comments within 60 days of publication in the Federal Register.  FSIS would like to hear from the public on a number of issues highlighted in the Federal Register notice, including the implementation of the policy and additional outreach the Agency will conduct, such as public meetings.

Over the past two years, FSIS has announced several new measures to safeguard the food supply, prevent food borne illness, and improve consumers' knowledge about the food they eat. These initiatives support the three core principles developed by the President's Food Safety Working Group (FSWG). Some of these actions include:

• Performance standards for poultry establishments for continued reductions in the occurrence of pathogens. USDA expects the new standards to prevent as many as 25,000 food borne illnesses annually. This includes a tougher performance standard for Salmonella and the first ever performance standard for Campylobacter.
• Test and hold policy that will significantly reduce consumer exposure to unsafe meat products, because products cannot be released into commerce until Agency test results for dangerous contaminants are known.
• Labeling proposals that provide better information to consumers about their food by requiring nutrition labels on single-ingredient raw meat and poultry products and by simplifying labeling language for raw meat and poultry products with added solutions that may not be apparent to the consumer.

For more information go to the FSIS website at www.fsis.usda.gov.

FSIS Directives & Notices

FSIS Notice 52-11 Sep 23, 2011
Nationwide Raw Liquid Egg Microbiological Baseline Survey Shakedown
FSIS Notice 53-11 Sep 23, 2011
In-Commerce Surveillance Priorities

More at http://www.fsis.usda.gov/Regulations_&_Policies/index.asp

Industry Insight: Data Dashboards Enhance Livestock Reports

USDA’s Agricultural Marketing Service is expanding upon its traditional Market News reports to create interactive dashboards.  The dashboards, first launched in the summer of 2010, provide quick, easy access to volume and price information for cattle, hogs, and sheep. Taking a more flexible and visual approach to reporting, the dashboards offer weekly data for cattle, hogs and sheep and daily tickers for cattle and hogs.  These user-friendly visualization tools bring market data to life and are a great complement to our traditional reports.

AMS collects and publishes a high volume of information for five major commodity areas.  The goal of the livestock dashboards is to offer tools that help farmers, ranchers, and other industry stakeholders manage, sort, and view data in a way that’s most meaningful to them.

USDA Market News livestock dashboards are also a valuable resource for the Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME) Group.  CME, which offers a wide variety of agricultural commodities futures and options available on any U.S. exchange, uses our data for feeder cattle and hog indexes. On a daily basis, they also use Market News reports for cash settlements and some of our Market News reporters are involved with CME live cattle deliveries.

By visiting USDA Market News you can view hundreds of pre-made commodity reports—including the livestock dashboards—or create a custom report to see only the information you need.

FSIS-ASK

Q: Is it mandatory to include an "Allergen" statement on meat, poultry, and egg product labels?

A: The Food Allergen Labeling and Consumer Protection Act (FALCPA) only apply to consumer packaged foods regulated by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). FDA regulates all foods except meat, poultry, and egg products, which are regulated by the Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS). FSIS recognizes that there is a need for clear and understandable terms for use on the label that would help allergen-sensitive individuals to make Informed food choices for all foods, including meat, poultry, and egg products. Therefore, FSIS has established policies to enable processors to voluntarily add allergen statements to the labeling of meat, poultry, and egg products, as long as such labeling is evaluated and approved by FSIS.

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Things to Ponder . . . . . . Did you ever wonder why dimes, quarters and half dollars have
                                             notches (milling), while pennies and nickels do not?

The US Mint began putting notches on the edges of coins containing gold and silver to discourage holders from shaving off small quantities of the precious metals.  Dimes, quarters and half dollars are notched because they used to contain silver.  Pennies and nickels aren't notched because the metals they contain are not valuable enough to shave.
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Public Food Safety Training Courses

SGS is offering the following Food Safety Training courses in October.  Contact John Miller at 931-652-8888 or Gary Ostrow at 561-613-1950 for registration and cost information.  Listed are courses in the southeast, for a full listing of locations and a brochure contact John or Gary.

October
GMP/HACCP Implementation  10/3-4/11  Orlando, FL
GMP/HACCP Internal Auditor 10/5-6/11  Orlando, FL
Commonalities and Differences between Major GFSI Schemes  10/7/11   Orlando, FL
Implementation of the BRC Global Standard for Food Safety  10/6-7/11   Memphis, TN
SQF 2000 Implementation   10/17-18/11   Orlando, FL
Steps to implement FSSC 22000 or ISO22000 Food Safety Management Systems 10/17-19/11
                                                                                                                                     New Orleans, LA

MEET NEW SEMA MEMBER

Witt Gas Controls LP is proud to become a new member of SEMA.  As the industry leader in gas control equipment, count on Witt to provide state of the art solutions to your food packaging needs.  From gas analyzers, to gas mixers to gas monitors, Witt brings over 65 years of experience and know- how to the MAP process.  Our featured products include the hand held OXYBABY® gas analyzer for both O2 and O2/CO2 applications.  For package leak detection, Witt produces LEAK-MASTER®, which provides non-destructive testing for even the smallest leaks.  And if your MAP process requires the mixing of gases, look to Witt for quality gas mixers designed for a variety of applications in the food packaging industry.

Witt is precise engineering and high quality designed to give you the best tools to protect your products and your reputation.  See all the Witt products at www.Wittgas.com.  For more information on Witt Gas contact Joe Creamer @ 770.664.4447 Alpharetta, GA

WELCOME NEW MEMBER

National Deli, LLC

7250 NW 35th Terrace   Miami, FL 33122
Rick Bruskin
305.592.030
Correction last month the address was printed 75th Terrace it should be 35th Terrace

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