"Consumers equate product quality 

 with food safety," says Nash, whose office 

 is at the North Carolina State University 

 Seafood Laboratory in Morehead City. 

 "'Many people assume that seafood is not as 

 safe as beef and poultry products. Seafood 

 that is properly cooked is as safe as any 

 cooked beef or poultry product." 



Mobley says state regulations protect 

 the consumer as well as the industry. In 

 addition, he says the section helps the 

 seafood industry put out a good product. 



While making routine inspections and 

 yearly recertification checks, environmental 

 health specialists encourage plants to 

 upgrade their processing facilities and 

 equipment. 



"In the last 10 years, the number of 

 crab plants has decreased, but crab process- 

 ing still leads the way in the seafood 

 industry," says Mobley. 



Several North Carolina crab plants 

 have installed sleek, modern equipment. At 

 CryoTech Food Systems in Aurora, every 

 live crab travels through a tunnel where it is cooked and frozen 

 The company also uses nitrogen freezing. 



Carolina Seafood Inc. in Aurora has remodeled its facility 

 to include fiberglass walls that are easy to clean and air 

 conditioning in the culling rooms where crabs are separated. 

 "We cool crabs as soon as they come off the boat," says owner 

 Etles Henries. "That way we have no spoilage." 



A worker shovels scraps of crabs at an eastern North Carolina plant. 



HACCP STANDARDS 



n 



on 



to state 



regulations, crab plants and other seafood processors must 

 follow HACCP' s stringent safety standards. Under the plan, 

 companies first scrutinize their operations for "hazards that are 

 reasonably likely to occur and would cause illness or injury to 

 the consumer." 



These include biological hazards such as bacteria and 

 viruses. At Washington Crab Company in Washington, owner 

 Jimmy Johnson says they pay particular attention to the 

 pasteurization process. 



"If you don't get the crabmeat pasteurized properly, you 

 don't kill the bacteria," says Johnson, chairman of the N.C. 

 Marine Fisheries Commission. 



Plants also must watch for chemical hazards such as 

 histamine, which is produced naturally by bacteria on certain 

 fish and can cause severe allergic reactions in some people. 

 Physical hazards include metal fragments. 



Businesses must then find ways to manage hazards 

 through "critical control points." To keep bacteria from 

 producing histamine in fish, for example, seafood is stored on 

 ice at or below 40 degrees. 



Under the rules, crab processors must record the time and 

 temperature at which each batch of crabs is cooked and monitor 

 their coolers at least twice daily. 



To help seafood companies with their cooking operations, 

 the NC State Seafood Lab has conducted validation tests at 15 

 facilities. 



"We conduct temperature distribution profiles to deter- 

 mine if the cooking schedule is adequate to eliminate harmful 

 bacteria," says Dave Green, director of the lab and a North 

 Carolina Sea Grant researcher. "We found all plants met the 

 minimum requirements, but in many cases, greater efficiency 

 could be achieved with simple changes in procedures." 



Under HACCP, companies must write and follow basic 

 sanitation standards, including using safe water in food 

 preparation and cleanliness of food surface contacts. 



How is the new program working? 



"We are satisfied that people are complying with 

 HACCP," says Reardon. "The most common violation is 

 record keeping. Most of the problems are around the mainte- 

 nance of records." 



Dealers and processors often complain about the extra 

 paperwork. Although Henries of Carolina Seafood supports the 

 basic principles of HACCP, he says the "paperwork is a 

 nightmare." 



8 EARLY SUMMER 2000 



