Source: Tom Johnston, MEATINGPLACE, 1/7/14


The Canadian Food Inspection Agency is doing an “adequate” job in maintaining equivalence with U.S. food safety standards but needs to improve in oversight of Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Point Systems (HACCP), sanitation and humane handling, according to a USDA audit recently published.

The audit, which included visits to seven food-processing facilities in the late fall of 2012, had been confidential until USDA published the findings last month. Since then CFIA has been working on improvements in response to the audit.

“If these actions continue to be effectively implemented, the system weaknesses should be remedied and equivalence maintained,” USDA’s Food Safety and Inspection Service wrote in the final report of the audit.  
As part of the audit, FSIS visited the XL Foods plant (now owned by JBS USA) near Brooks, Alberta, that recalled a record amount of beef products in 2012 amid an outbreak of E. coli O157:H7. Washington delisted the plant in September and relisted it in December. FSIS visited while the facility was barred from sending product to the U.S. but still operating for the domestic market.

FSIS noted non-compliances in HACCP implementation, and humane handling and sanitation problems at the XL plant and other facilities, including a hog slaughter facility in Langley, British Columbia.

FSIS determines equivalence based on six components: government oversight, statutory authority and food safety regulations, sanitation, HACCP, chemical residue programs, and microbiological testing programs.
An “adequate” rating is the lowest of three scores, including “average” and “well-performing,” and means Canadian product gets a closer eye at the border.

Canada exported 1.4 billion pounds of meat and poultry products to the United States between Oct. 1, 2011, and Sept. 30, 2012. Of that amount, 68 million pounds were re-inspected at Port-of-Entry (POE) in the United States. A total of 755,811 pounds were rejected at POE, of which 166,211 pounds were for failures of public health significance because of Listeria monocytogenes, E. coli 0157:H7, or fecal contamination.

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