The war on micro-organisms
19 June 2009
Hartley’s Farm Foods, a family run firm which has been in the food business for three generations and was established in 1927 as poultry farmers, has declared war on micro-organisms. Here's how:
The Lancashire-based business grew to include meat processing and then developed its own retail outlets, and today it specialises in the production of cooked meat and sandwich fillings, supplying to Asda, Morrisons, sandwich shop chains and ready-meal makers as well delicatessens.
Hartley’s has won several awards for the high quality and great taste of its products, including Winner of the 2005 North West Fine Foods Producer of the Year Award and Cut Meat Category Winner at Food North West 2009.
Operating from a 10,000 square foot state-of-the-art factory, built in 2006 close to the original farm, Hartley’s Farm Foods uses mainly UK sourced meat and employs 40 people locally on its production line.
Working with a broad range of raw and cooked meats with widely varying processing requirements, Hartley’s Farm Foods naturally places a high priority on having effective hygiene management practices and systems in place to guard against harmful micro-organisms and ensure product safety.
However, with ever-increasing demands placed on food processors in the area of risk management, managing director, Michael Hartley stresses that no-one can afford to be complacent:
“Maintaining secure hygiene standards is essential for anyone working in food processing and companies cannot stand still if they are to meet and exceed current best practice industry guidelines. To evolve you have to be better than good and we’re always looking at ways to improve our safety standards.”
Getting physical with nature: This was the thinking behind the decision to purchase the Radical range of sanitisers. Radical use advanced oxidation technology to create naturally occurring biocides which deliver a direct physical kill to harmful micro-organisms that can cause salmonella, listeria, e-coli and other common food hygiene related illnesses.
As the Radical Water System delivers a physical kill it means that micro-organisms cannot develop a resistance, as happens with many chemical-based sanitisers such as chlorine. The Radical range of sanitisers use only naturally occurring substances which do not impact on the environment and leave no taints or residues.
Hartley’s deploy the Radical range of products in all their high risk meat processing areas. The Radical Water System is used during the day to sanitise surfaces and utensils.
“It’s a far more efficient method of sanitising than relying on chemicals because our staff can carry on working immediately afterwards,” says Mr Hartley. “The ozonated water is completely safe to handle and breaks down after use into its basic components - water and oxygen. This has a massive impact on our output as vital production time is not lost.”
At night, when the factory is not in use, the whole room sanitiser is used which pumps an ozonated vapour into the production areas. This diffuses into every corner of the room, bathing all exposed surfaces and penetrating all recesses and hard-to-reach areas such as equipment, cleaning fabrics, drains and air conditioning vents.
Test results: In laboratory tests the Radical systems delivered kill rates in excess of 99.9% over a range of eight major organisms, prompting Dr Mathew Upton of the Microbiology Department at Manchester University to state: “The process has great potential for use in sanitising all surfaces and equipment in the food industries and catering environments.”
“Since we’ve been using the Radical equipment as part of our sanitising regime our test results have certainly seen a significant improvement,” says Michael Hartley.
“Perhaps the biggest benefit to us is peace of mind. With the Radical system you are not relying on the human factor to sanitise manually. You have a second line of defence in the war on micro-organisms and that gives our sanitising regime an edge. It’s certainly become an essential part of our programme. ”
Related Articles...
Most Viewed Articles...
