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'Deviations' Mar Inspection of Jakarta Tuna Plant

By Dan Flynn and Suzanna Schreck

On one of its websites, Jakarta's P.T. Tuna Permata Rezeki says it runs a "strict HACCP compliance factory."
That's not exactly what a U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) inspection found at the Indonesian seafood processing facility last Oct. 21 and 22.
Instead, the FDA said it found "deviations" from the Seafood Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Point regulations that must be followed if a foreign company wants to export product to the USA.
FDA issued a Form-483 to the Jakarta company after the inspection, and the seafood processor responded on Nov. 6 with a revised HACCP and an explanation of corrections being made at the facility.
When a processor of fish or fishery products fails to have and implement a proper HACCP plan, FDA says it causes the fish or fishery products to be adulterated.  "Accordingly, you tuna is adulterated, in that it has been prepared, packed, or held under insanitary conditions whereby it may have been rendered injurious to health," FDA said in a March 9 warning letter to P.T. Tuna.
FDA said the company needed to conduct or have conducted a hazard analysis for each of its products to determine whether food safety hazards are likely to occur.
It said P.T. Tuna failed to take into account the food safety hazard of Clostridium botulinum growth and toxin formation.  FDA is especially concerned about that when the product is held in sealed bags.  It said temperatures must not exceed 38 degrees.
FDA also said the company's HACCP plan did not address "decomposition" and the "receiving raw material" stage.
The HACCP should address keeping the fish on ice, FDA said.
Further, FDA took exception to some of the "corrective actions" P.T. Tuna said it planned to take, including rejecting decomposed fish and adding ice and continuing to monitor product that lacks ice.
"You should respond in writing within fifteen (15) working days from your receipt of this letter," the warning letter says.  "Your response should outline the specific things you are doing to correct these violations. Your response should include documentation, such as: a copy of any revised HACCP plans; at least five (5) product days worth of monitoring records to demonstrate that you have implemented the revised plan; any verification records; and any other useful information that would assist us in evaluating your corrections."

Full post as published by Food Safety News on March 25, 2011 (boomark / email).