And now:Ish <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Meatpackers will test irradiated beef
Thursday, April 15, 1999
By Omaha World-Herald, Neb.
A number of large ground-beef producers, including IBP Inc. and Excel
Corp., will test-market beef irradiated by a system to be installed this
year at a Sioux City, Iowa, company.
Titan Corp., a San Diego company, said Monday that it will build and
operate an "electronic-pasteurization system" at Cloverleaf Cold Storage
Co. in Sioux City. The California company said it would be the first such
"E-Beam system" specifically designed to pasteurize ground beef.
At the same time, Titan also said that it has agreements with "certain
large ground beef producers" that will use its system to eliminate such
bacteria as E. coli O157:H7, Listeria monocytogenes, salmonella and
campylobacter.
Gene W. Ray, president and chief executive officer of Titan, declined to
identify the companies or to say how many will use his company's system.
However, spokesmen for IBP of Dakota City, Neb., and Excel, a unit of
Minneapolis-based Cargill Inc., confirmed that their companies are
participating.
"As we've said before, we are interested in test marketing irradiated
ground beef in order to gauge consumer interest," said Gary Mickelson, an
IBP spokesman. "And the new Titan facility will allow us to provide this
option to our customers."
IBP does not now irradiate any of its products, he said. "However, we view
irradiation as another potential tool to enhance food safety."
The Department of Agriculture in February approved irradiation of red meat
as a way to eliminate food-borne illnesses. Last year the Food and Drug
Administration approved the process for red meat.
Titan Corp., a publicly traded company, said it uses an
electronic-pasteurization process that disrupts the DNA structure of
microorganisms on or within a product, rendering them sterile. The system
uses commercial electricity as the source of electrons that are accelerated
to pass through the food.
Mark Klein, a spokesman for Excel, said his company has investigated the
use of electron-beam technology, participating last year in tests conducted
by Dennis Olson, director of Iowa State University's food irradiation
laboratory.
Klein said Excel plans to test-market ground beef patties that will be
processed through the Titan system.
Titan executives declined to disclose the cost of the project and its
system, which has been patented under the name SureBeam.
Eric Demarco, Titan's executive vice president and chief financial officer,
said the system will be installed in an existing part of the Cloverleaf
plant, which will undergo improvements to accommodate the equipment.
Titan executives were closemouthed about the project because, as the
company said in documents filed with the Securities and Exchange
Commission, "the market for sterilization services is intensely competitive
and is characterized by significant price competition."
"Our technology has been proven," Ray said from his office in San Diego.
"We own and operate two very similar facilities that are used now for
medical products, and we have sold a number of systems to medical-product
manufacturers."
While IBP, Excel and the other meatpacking companies plan to use the Sioux
City facility, Ray said he hopes that the companies would want to install
the system later on their own production lines.
Titan said that the companies with which it has agreements account for
about half of the 8 billion pounds of ground beef produced annually in the
United States.
ConAgra Inc., whose red-meat operating companies also produce ground beef,
has talked to Titan and to "just about everybody who is involved in that
kind of technology" but has not signed any agreements with any company,
said Lynn Phares, a spokeswoman.
A spokeswoman for Farmland Industries, which owns National Beef Co., said
her company was not participating.
Omaha-based APA Inc. will provide engineering and design services for the
Titan company's system. Spencer Stevens, APA president, said the project
should be completed and ready for operation in November or December.
"We will be able to deliver doses that meet not only the pathogen-reduction
requirements but also to ensure that the product has the most wholesale
taste and appearance," he said.
With the approval of the FDA and the Agriculture Department -- although
final rules are still to come -- two roadblocks to irradiated meat have
been removed. That leaves the question of whether consumers will accept
such products.
"We believe consumers should be given the choice," Excel's Klein said.
"That's why we'll move forward with it. Some (consumers) will accept it,
some won't."
In its SEC filings, Titan said: "Unless meat producers and large-scale
sellers such as chain restaurants decide to pasteurize or purchase
pasteurized meat, this market is unlikely to develop."
If the market develops, the company said its technology will compete. Titan
Corp. had a net loss of $19.7 million, or 57 cents a share, on revenue of
$303.4 million for 1998. The company's performance included special
acquisition and other related charges, discontinued operations and the
effect of a change in accounting principles.
Excluding all the charges and other factors, Titan's net earnings for 1998
were $13.5 million, or 35 cents a share.
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Comments:
Flourine was a severe problem connected with the Manhattan Projects
uranium operations in WWII and after-------so what happened was something to
make flourine damage more OK. They came up with the idea that it slowed
tooth decay-----mainly due to the toxicity if put in water or tooth pastes.
A dentist in Oak Ridge even pioneered the idea.
Today, to make radiation more accepatable we appear to be wanting to
justify the need for food irradiation, which just happens to cover up the
very real dangers of the human immune resistance being damaged. This
resulting in less resistance to E-coli, and a number of viruses.
What we really need is less pollution----------not more band aids and
excuses from a nuclear industry that has poisioned the population and ruined
its health.
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Note: Past legislation has removed labelling which indicates if a product
has been genetically manipulated to produce its own pesticide. Many of
these genetically altered foods are now marketed under name brand
labels..(develop a food allergy or asthma in the past couple of years? It
may be the pesticide produced by the plant itself). this is an adivsory
that this most likely will be the case on irradiated meats..you will
quickly lose the choice when labelling is forbidden.
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Tsonkwadiyonrat (We are ONE Spirit)
Unenh onhwa' Awayaton
http://www.tdi.net/ishgooda/
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