ALMOST A quarter of butchers display a use-by date that has no basis and is unrealistically long, according to a Food Safety Authority of Ireland survey released yesterday.
The chief executive of the authority, Prof Alan Reilly, said the situation was “not acceptable”, and called on butchers to comply with guidelines for handling food.
The survey concerned the quality of raw chicken fillets in the Republic that were distributed to butchers in gas-flushed bulk packs before being sold loose to the consumer.
At least 23 per cent of the 138 products sampled carried a use-by date that was unrealistically long for the meat to remain unspoiled in the consumer’s fridge, while 8 per cent provided no use-by date at all.
The authority said the cause for concern with the affected chicken fillets was one of spoilage rather than food safety. Given that consumers might store the fillets in the fridge at home, there was a strong possibility that some of them would show signs of physical spoilage, such as smell, taste or appearance.
Associated Craft Butchers of Ireland president John Barrett welcomed the report, and said there was confusion among butchers about Food Safety Authority guidelines concerning the handling of gas-flushed bulk packs.
“We would totally support the Food Safety Authority and all the work that they do. To the best of my knowledge we have already e-mailed the report to all our members and it is certainly going to be topical to say the least, which we welcome,” said Mr Barrett.
“We would like to adhere to all their guidelines. It is a very specialised type of packaging as there are gases involved in it. It is hard to expect the butcher to be completely up to date with it all.”
Mr Barrett said he would like to see improved training for butchers and said a future partnership with State agencies could help upgrade skills.
“I can only speak for our own association and this report does not specify if any of our members were actually sampled at all. I would hope they all are fully compliant with the guidelines,” said Mr Barrett, whose association represents about half of stand-alone butchers in Ireland.
“We are trying to improve our standards all the time, and the report also showed an awful lot of butchers are doing a lot of things very right. But again I cannot take credit for that anymore than blame for the problems as it could be none of our members.”
In a statement by the authority, Prof Reilly encouraged butchers to learn the guidelines.
“Consumers should feel 100 per cent assured that the chicken fillets they are buying are of the highest quality and that the use-by dates on the food label are correct.
“If consumers have concerns about the freshness of their chicken fillets when they come to use them, they should take it up with the butcher and complain,” he said.
“The onus is on butchers to adhere to best-practice guidelines with respect to the opening of gas-flushed bulk packs, storage temperatures and applying use-by dates,” said Prof Reilly.