Tracing and tracking poultry in New Zealand

Jill Galloway reports in the New Zealand press that the poultry industry there is working to make poultry and eggs able to be traced back to their origin, but says it is not an easy job given the high number of eggs and birds that are produced and processed. She notes that most poultry meat produced in New Zealand is eaten there, so the poultry industry is not being driven by export markets to the same extent as other food industries, such as lamb. Poultry meat in New Zealand is predominantly chicken but includes turkey, duck, pheasant, guinea fowl, quail and goose meat.

 

Poultry Industry Association of New Zealand (PIANZ) spokeswoman Natalie Gerber says although there is not the overseas pressure to be able to trace poultry meat and eggs, the safety of consumers in New Zealand is just as important as that of overseas customers. Tracking and traceability have become hot topics for all livestock businesses around the world, as both consumer concerns about food safety and the improved ability of food regulators to respond to disease outbreaks have grown. Beef, lamb and deer producers and processing industries have been grappling with practical ways to implement traceability from a New Zealand farm to overseas plate. "The practicalities of tracing mammalian livestock and large birds such as emus and ostriches are well understood," Ms Gerber says. "However the practical implementation of these concepts in the poultry industry is somewhat more difficult."

 

For example it would not be possible to individually number and record every broiler chicken grown on any given farm, she says. "But the uniqueness of the poultry industry does make it possible to treat whole groups of birds, and in some cases farms, as a single unit because all broiler chickens in any given shed and on any given farm at the same time will receive identical treatment in terms of feed, water and any medication.".

 

New Zealand poultry industry is highly integrated, with poultry processors owning the birds from day old until slaughter in most cases, Ms Gerber says. Production cycles in the poultry meat industry are considerably shorter than those in other meat industries. It takes an average of 37 days to produce a 2 kilogram broiler chicken and 15 weeks to produce a 10 kilogram turkey. PIANZ and the Egg Producers Federation (EPF), under contract to Biosecurity New Zealand, are currently working on a biosecurity risk profile for the poultry industry. The risk profile identifies the risks and potential spread of a disease within the sector or industry and predicts the trace backs and trace forwards that would be required. It is will be completed in June 2006.

 

The IDTechEx conference Food Traceability 2006, held on February 1-2 2006 in Dallas, USA, was a great success with attendance from 13 countries. There was a consensus that track, trace and identify are merging as both sciences and needs. Requirements and executions before and after the farm gate are also becoming seamless. These barriers are rapidly breaking down. New sources of data such as RFID, 2D barcodes and widespread DNA analysis are creating a challenge in the sheer volume of data generated. www.trackingfood.com 

 

Miss the event? Don't miss out! Purchase the presentations and audio records at www.trackingfood.com 

 

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