In the life of a butcher, there are many factors to consider before you are able to open your door for the first time; many of these considerations are food standards, and many relate to hygiene equipment. 

These are on top of the many other skills today’s butcher must have in their locker, such as being able to identify the anatomical features of the: 

• Different species of livestock
• The proportion of different cuts in each carcass
• The tools required to break down the animal
• The proper ways to use those tools.

Hygiene practices are among the most stringent in ANY industry for butchers. 

Nowadays, hygiene in food processing is not just cleanliness but also food safety and quality during the process from farm to table. 

And one of the main protagonists in this chain is the butcher. 

So, we have put together a quick guide to serve as a basic information source for the best hygiene practices for you and your hygiene equipment. 

We will point out all the facets you need to be aware of and practise to ensure you stay on the right side of the authorities.

So, look at this as either a reminder or a checklist of what you need to be on top of. Let’s get going!

Food Safety Concepts

There are many practices involved in food safety, but a butcher needs to know about the pathology of foodborne pathogens, where do they come from, and how do they manage them?

Personal Hygiene

A mere washing of hands is not enough. Keeping clean, dressing properly and knowing about the impact of our own habits on food hygiene is very important.

This will inevitably fall under the umbrella of Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) which plays a significant role in overall hygiene when you are handling and processing meats. 

Disinfection of Instruments and Tools

Since cleanliness plays a significant role in avoiding contamination,

When it comes to hygiene equipment, a butcher must be aware of the entire procedure to:

• Cleaning
• Disinfecting

And Maintaining:

• Grinding Machines
• Knives
• And Cutting Boards…

In a most detailed manner.

From Meat Production to the Dinner Table: How Meat is Handled and Stored. 

Ensuring you are up-to-speed on the guidelines on good practices relating to meat handling (reception of carcasses, butchery and safe storage temperatures) and on the importance of traceability in the food supply chain will stand you in good stead.

If you don’t, that’s an area to brush up on. 

Facility Hygiene

A clean shop is a healthy shop. 

One area you need to know and then maintain is procedures for daily, weekly and monthly cleanings, as well as the importance of planning the layout to enable hygienic practices.

Efficient use of space is a valuable tool for any butcher, but saving space is not about cutting hygiene corners; they MUST go hand-in-hand.

Regulatory Compliance

There is no wiggle room when it comes to food safety regulations. 

The complexities of the law with respect to butchers are defined by safeguards that they should take to avoid compliance issues with all standards.

If this is a grey area, then go back to basics and contact your local authority with questions. Today, government agencies in the food industry are very much online to handle questions, so ask away! 

Training & Education

Training is very important in order to get better performance.

With so many online training courses available, a butcher’s time is best spent behind a computer learning new tasks rather than running around. 

In addition to this, there are regular law changes coming in faster than previously for hygiene equipment due to the evolution of the industry with new technology and AI contributing to this, so keeping on top of these developments is a must.

Emergency Procedures

Dealing with outbreaks caused by contaminated raw materials will depend on how ready people are to react in the right way. 

Be sure to understand the latest guidelines to help with handling hazards, recalls, and other unfortunate events.

You will need to identify quickly whether a problem is hygiene equipment related or something else as to where contamination has originated from and the quickest and best course of action to take. 

Customer Education

It extends the butcher’s role when educating the consumer about safe meat handling, storage and preparation, plus the same for hygiene equipment. 

To many people who understand little of the industry, this may all sound a little over-the-top, but as a butcher, it never hurts to explain what you have to do to be able to get this to the table; a little education goes a long way.

Butchers in Ireland have to work according to hygiene regulations to ensure the safety and quality of food.

Regulations and What They Entail

Here’s an overview of the key regulations: 

• General Hygiene Rules: General hygiene rules apply to butchers as for all other matters concerning general hygiene procedures – the cleansing of premises and facilities, hygiene in general (including in matters of toilets), pests and their control and discarded materials.

• Special Hygiene Regulations for Foods of Animal Derivation: Rules about what happens to meat during preparation, preservation and presentation.

• Specified Risk Material (SRM) and Animal By-Products (ABP): These define risk tissues, which must be discarded using special procedures to prevent the spread of disease, such as BSE.

• Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Points (HACCP): HACCP requirements require each butcher to assess the food safety hazards that must be monitored and establish critical control points that, when monitored and controlled, assure food safety.

• Training and Education: Butcher and their staff must have training of food safety concern to keep butcher shop clean and it also can help with the legislation of butcher shop.

FSAI enforces these standards and butchers, too, need to be familiar with all applicable legislation for them to operate a butcher shop safely and legally. 

SUMMARY

Food processing hygiene is holistic in its application – and all-encompassing in its demand for attention and commitment. Hygiene Equipment is going through an evolutionary stage in its development, with technologies pushing the boundary of faster and more efficient production. With this comes hygiene standard changes, so be sure to stay on top of it. Good luck!