It was late 1950’s when the astronauts were sent into space with hazard-free food. This food had to be 100% safe from all food-borne diseases as NASA couldn’t take any chance with the astronauts’ health during their space flight. Hectic efforts were on to find some organization that could meet this requirement.
Ultimately, a company with the name of Pillsbury was selected and was assigned this responsibility and awarded the contract. It had to undergo elaborate safety requirements to produce hazard-free food. In this effort, Pillsbury mainly focused on the development of processes involved thus laying the basis for food safety standard.
Though, most of us eat three to four times a day we hardly bother to check whether the food we are consuming is fit for our health. The food that reaches our table has to pass through various stages, like growing, harvesting, storing, washing, preserving, chilling, cooking, and serving. All these stages are prone to the attack of pathogens that can enter and contaminate the food. We should be fully aware of all these sources and know how to minimize or deny the entry of pathogens in our food.
In some countries, food is imported from other countries. The quality of the imported food should be tested through accredited laboratories. This is required because there are countries which do not have any food standard of their own. These countries should adopt food standards which are already in vogue globally like Hazard Analysis Critical Control Points (HACCP). HACCP prevents contamination of food by building food safety measures into the manufacturing process rather than end-product testing.
Regarding the quality of the imported food, I would like to share one of my personal experiences with the readers.
I usually take wheat cereal in my breakfast which is imported from an EU country. One day when I was taking this cereal with milk, I noticed two red insects floating in the milk along with the cereal grains. Upon examination, I found that one of the two packets, each packet containing 12 cakes of cereal each, wasn’t fully covered with the packing paper at the bottom. It amply revealed that the quality assurance system of the company wasn’t working properly.
When you are in the United States, you would see that the government has a tight control on the food items whereas in actual practice, only 5% of the total food is checked by the inspectors of Food and Drug Administration (FDA).
To check the entire food, a colossal amount would be required. Sometime back, there was a case of salmonella in contaminated peanut butter products due to which nine deaths occurred. President Obama showed his concern and asked the FDA to overhaul its decades old system.
If we just pay some attention to one of the simplest practices like hand washing, we can save ourselves from a lot of diseases. This requires only warm water and soap.
We can be infected with germs during our activities throughout the day that include hand shaking, touching surfaces contaminated with bacteria, food, etc. If you don’t care about this practice, you can infect yourself with these germs by inadvertently touching various part of your body like your eyes, mouth, nose, etc.
If you want to follow food safety practices, there are four cardinal principles which you will have to follow:
• Clean: Wash hands and surfaces.
• Separate: Prevent cross-contamination of foods.
• Cook: Heat foods to proper temperatures.
• Chill: Promptly refrigerate.
(Azfar A. Khan is a consultant who conducts awareness courses on Food Safety and other International Standards. He also conducts courses on Internal Quality Audits. He can be reached at: [email protected])
