Poultry Post-Mortem Disposition Manual Project

                                  

Objective

Design an illustrated Broiler Chickens Postmortem Disposition Manual to help poultry slaughter establishments train their employees to conduct the carcass and associated viscera sorting activities that are required under the New Poultry Inspection System (NPIS) 9 CFR 381.76(b)(6)(ii)(A). Furthermore, this manual will be created to help learners/food safety professionals improve their competency in detecting postmortem pathological lesions (food safety and non-food safety) and apply this information to their workplace. 

Introduction

 All poultry sold in interstate commerce must be federally inspected for wholesomeness. The disposition of poultry is guided by criteria that are found in the Poultry Inspection Regulations. Familiarity with Code of Federal Regulations (CFR) 381 is particularly important to determine whether chicken carcasses are wholesome and fit for human consumption. 9 CFR 381.76(b)(6)(ii)(A) states “ The establishment must conduct carcass with associated viscera sorting activities, dispose of carcasses and parts exhibiting condemnable conditions, and conduct appropriate trimming and reprocessing activities before carcasses are presented to the online carcass inspector.”  

The proposed illustrated manual is to serv as a guide in making post-mortem disposition of young chicken carcasses. This manual is intended to show the most common lesions of broilers, and it should help both NPIS (New Poultry Inspection System) sorters, FSIS inspectors and other food safety professionals make correct and appropriate disposition. The proposed manual will be a valuable tool in identifying different lesions and its effect on broilers disposition, however, it is not intended to replace sound judgment in inspecting broilers carcasses.

Condemnation and Final Disposition

On the basis of the inspector's postmortem examination, birds are passed, trimmed and passed, retained for disposition by the Veterinary Medical Officer (VMO), or condemned for any of the most 12 distinct reasons identified in the Code of Federal Regulation 381. The USDA-FSIS authorizes young chicken slaughter establishment to operate at a maximum line speed of 140 birds per minute. Thus, with three sorters on the slaughter line, sorters in NPIS plants have only about 1.28 seconds or less to examine each bird and decide its disposition.  In this manner more than 9 billion birds were inspected in fiscal year 2020 (USDA-FSIS & North American Meat Institute). 

Note that FSIS online carcass inspectors are only required to visually inspect each carcass presented to them. The inspection is hands free but not hand off and carcass manipulation is exceedingly rare. This manual will enable the sorters and inspectors to recognize conditions that make chicken carcasses unwholesome and unfit for human consumption. Therefore, creating a simple Broiler Chickens Postmortem Disposition manual with a combination of clear images and short videos of the most prevalent postmortem lesions is crucial for the production of safe food. 

Target User Groups 

1- Poultry Slaughter Establishments (NPIS & Traditional)

2- FSIS Inspectors and Other Food Safety Professionals

3- Veterinarians & Veterinary Students.

Problem statement

Establishments that slaughter and process poultry confront many threats and obstacles that can affect productivity, profitability, and the ability to meet customers’ demands. Two of the most important challenges are lack of well-trained workforce and complying with the USDA-FSIS (Food Safety Inspection Service) regulatory requirements to produce safe food product. 

One of the ways of solving this problem is providing the employees with the required skills and trainings through the Broiler Postmortem disposition manual to be successful in the workplace. An enthusiastic training and development program can have numerous short- and long-term benefits, including increasing employee knowledge, mitigating food safety risks, and giving poultry establishments a competitive advantage. In addition, proper training helps create a cohesive/confident taskforce, and minimizes the risk of any regulatory control action that could be taken by the USDA-FSIS. The food safety regulations landscape is currently undergoing a period of extraordinary change, and therefore it is a challenge to keep up to speed on the issues. This manual cannot teach learners everything, hence it really focuses on developing sorters and other food safety professional postmortem logical disposition skills on a high-speed slaughter line.

Experiment Design:

Hypothesis: 

H0: Broiler Chickens Postmortem Disposition training attended/studied by sorters/learners has no effect on their ability to identify pathological conditions that could render chicken carcasses unfit for human consumption.

H1: Broiler Chickens Postmortem Disposition training attended/studied by sorters/learners has positive effect on their ability to identify pathological conditions that could render chicken carcasses unfit for human consumption.

 My plan is to use group(s) of students from UIUC and/or other universities or colleges as a model to test my hypothesis.  The group of students will be randomly divided into the following groups:

1- The Experimental Group (Treatment Group): It receives the Broiler Chickens Postmortem Disposition Manual training. The Treatment Group takes a test at the end of the training to measure their knowledge and scores

2- The Control Group: It receives no training at all. However, the Control Group takes the same test at the same time with the Treatment Group to measure their scores. 

3- All variables apart from the treatment will be kept constant between the two groups to prevent any interference from confounding factors. Since the only variable that differs between the two groups is the Broiler Chickens Postmortem Disposition training manual, any differences in average scores between the two groups can be credited to the training manual they received.

References:

• United States Department of Agriculture-Food Safety Inspection Service (USDA-FSIS)
• Code of Federal Regulations (9 CFR)
• North American Meat Institute