An Assessment of the sources of contamination at abattoirs around Harare

Author

Muhvawa, Tinotenda

Title

An Assessment of the sources of contamination at abattoirs around Harare

Abstract

Poor standards of hygiene during slaughtering or carcasses handling results in high levels of microbial contamination in the meat, reduction of shelf-life and adversely affecting the sensoric properties of products fabricated from this meat. This have resulted in high returns of more than 1000kgs of beef meat due to decaying that have been experienced at various abattoirs from its customers per month. The study was designed to assess possible sources of contamination at abattoirs that are around Harare and their prevalence on these sources. Two sets of three swab samples were collected from meat handler’s hands and equipments (hooks and on working knives) from the following abattoirs; Koala Park, Rainham, Lisheen, Pama and Meatfield Abattoirs .The samples were randomly collected from abattoir equipment and meat handlers’ hands. The following pathogens were isolated from different abattoirs; giadia , cryptosporidium, bacillus, staphylococcus aereus, streptococcus group D, shigella, escherichia coli and yeasts. The presence of these pathogens including escherichia-coli indicated that there was poor separation of offals from the rest of the carcasses since these pathogens are mostly isolated from the gut systems of warm blooded animals. The spreading of these pathogens to meat handler’s hands and equipments showed that there is high potential of transferring them to other parts of the slaughtered animal causing meat contamination. Recommendations were drawn from the research that an in-house pathogens monitoring must be constituted and abattoirs must train workers on proper hygiene practices during slaughtering so as to prevent meat contamination.

Date

December 2015

Publisher

BUSE

Keywords

Slaughtering

Microbial contamination

Carcasses handling

Supervisor

Mr. C. Mangwiro