Author(s): Reis, Isabel Margarida Lopes Santos Prado Correia
Date: 2011
Persistent ID: http://hdl.handle.net/10400.5/4068
Origin: Repositório da UTL
Subject(s): beef meat; slaughterhouse; food safety; microrganism; indicators of hygiene; meat quality
Mestrado em Engenharia Alimentar - Instituto Superior de Agronomia
Beef meat is highly valued and preferred when it comes to livestock species. It is therefore necessary that it reaches the consumer in the best hygienic and sanitary conditions. Human health depends, to a great extent, on the quality and healthiness of the food, as these can constitute a potential sanitary risk. Regarding meat, it is the slaughterhouse which is greatly responsible for its quality. The aim of this work is to study the effects in the slaughter line, reducing the time between the stunning and the bleeding, increasing the time between the next tasks and consequently improving the working conditions of the operators and the hygiene throughout the process, noticing a decrease in the spoilage of the carcass, which has a reflection in the results of the management indicators analysed. This optimization was tested by the evaluation of the control of the productive process, good practices of production, the process of hygiene and organization of the cutting utensils, the level control of the carcass hygiene and the bacteriologic profile of the surfaces and cutting utensils. In this study, the microbiologic results relating to the carcass and the cutting utensils before and after optimization of the slaughtering line, reflected a decrease in values not only in aerobic mesophilic micro-organisms 30ºC, but also in Enterobacteriaceae and Salmonella. This improvement at a microbiological level is a great indicator of the efficiency of the hygiene process along the productive process and the improvements undergone in the slaughtering technology, resulting in high quality meat.
