Food Safety News

Mohammad “Ali” Usman has been hired as the Chief Information Officer (CIO) of the Federal Maritime Commission and appointed to be a member of the Senior Executive Service.Usman will serve as director in all areas of information technology (IT) and as the primary IT technical advisor to the Managing Director.He assumes his new duties effective immediately.“Well functioning, publicly accessible, and secured information systems are vital to being able to meet the mission of a government agency in the 21st Century. Mr.

A confession. I'm part of a very big problem that's easy to ignore. Last year, I contributed the U.S. average-per-person 300 pounds of plastic garbage to wherever it went after convenient curbside pickup. So out of sight, out of mind, right? Not really, but does it matter? Yes, it does.In a fascinating recent report, the National Academy of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine politely told us that we're choking ourselves to death on manufactured plastic waste and that 80% of the harmful plastic in the ocean comes from land-based sources.It's the micro-plastics…

Makers of Irish whiskey, Belgian chocolate and European coffee brands are scrambling to comply with new Chinese food and beverage regulations, with many fearful their goods will be unable to enter the giant market as a Jan. 1 deadline looms.China's customs authority published new food safety rules in April stipulating all food manufacturing, processing and storage facilities abroad need to be registered by year-end for their goods to access the Chinese market.But detailed procedures explaining how to get the required registration codes were only issued in October…

Tetranet is offering a solution to the maritime, offshore, ports and logistics markets an industrial walkthrough Covid19/virus and spores sanitizer as business seeks to return to normal. Designed for both inside and outside use, the company says it is ideal for  ports/harbors, terminals, onboard cruise ships, as well as on offshore rigs. Features touted by the company include: Walkthrough all body automatic harmless mist sterilization using HOCL (Hypochlorous) independently tested to kill 99.9999% of bacteria…

Digital technology leader ABB has won a contract from Arctic Offshore Farming to power its first-ever remote controlled submersible offshore salmon farm in the Arctic Ocean.ABB will provide a comprehensive package of its leading electrical, automation, instrumentation and telecom technologies that ensure maximum efficiency and minimal environmental impact.With the global market volume of salmon expected to hit 4.5 million tons by 2023, according to a 2018 report by Research and Markets, the Arctic Offshore Farming project is looking for ways to farm fish in a more sustainable manner.The submerged fish pens are less prone to sea lice which have been linked to a decline in salmon production in Norway – one of the top salmon exporters in the world.

Lineage Logistics  and Dreisbach Enterprises announced the official opening of Lineage Cool Port Oakland, the world’s latest next-generation cold storage and logistics facility.Set on 25 acres at the Port of Oakland’s waterfront, Cool Port will serve as the newest hub for temperature-controlled cargo transitioning through Northern California.Cool Port is a collaboration between warehousing and logistics industry leaders Lineage and Dreisbach, with additional funding and support from the Port of Oakland and the State of California. This combination brings together world-class cold-chain logistics expertise and steadfast commitment to innovation and community growth.“We are excited to expand Lineage’s dynamic…

TOTE Maritime Alaska has announced that the installation of ORBCOMM’s telematics devices across a broad equipment platform will be complete in the coming months. ORBCOMM was selected to provide a broad portfolio of telematics solutions to monitor and control its refrigerated, dry and flatbed equipment. TOTE Maritime Alaska is a leading Jones Act carrier serving the Alaska market, connecting greater Alaska to the Continental United States and beyond. This is the second deployment for TOTE Maritime…

French wheat exports to Indonesia are on hold as traders await the approval of a food safety agreement between the two countries, something exporters say is being delayed by Indonesia in retaliation against a French palm oil tax plan. A farm ministry official from Indonesia, the world's largest producer of palm oil, said the delay was a procedural one, and denied any link to the proposed tax. France's additional tax on palm oil, due to come into force next year, is billed as an environmental levy on a product associated with deforestation and other environmental damage. The delay to exports from the European Union's largest grain exporter was on the agenda of France's Secretary of State for Trade Matthias Fekl when he travelled to Indonesia earlier this month.

Allegations of illnesses caused by being on board a ship can lead to significant costs for shipowners. UK P&I Club Senior Claims Executive Victoria Brown reviews shipowners’ liabilities and the implications of a recent court case on future claims. Claims from passengers alleging that they have contracted gastric illness whilst on Members’ ships are common, and defending them requires significant amounts of documentation to establish that proper procedures were followed to prevent the occurrence and spread of infection, along with evidence that the illness was not caused by any fault on the part of the ship or its crew. Consequently, members have often ended up settling these types of claims.

Trident Seafoods has opened a $40 million production and distribution center in Carrollton, Ga., providing 175 full-time jobs and the capacity to produce 50,000 tons of finished products annually for the U.S. market. "We are excited to add Trident to our family of customers, especially within the valuable refrigerated cargo market," said Georgia Ports Authority Executive Director Curtis Foltz. Savannah's Garden City Terminal offers 84 refrigerated container racks and 814 chassis plug-ins, powering 2,830 refrigerated boxes at a time.

The European Commission will publish detailed reports on its negotiations with the United States to forge the world's biggest trade pact, EU trade chief Cecilia Malmstrom said on Friday, responding to criticism that the talks have been shrouded in secrecy. If agreed, the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) would encompass a third of world trade, and proponents say it would deliver more than $100 billion of economic gains on both sides. But opponents in Europe have voiced concern that it could erode EU standards on food safety and the environment, and argue the negotiations have not been transparent. In a blog post, Malmstrom said one of her first decisions as trade commissioner when she took office last year had been to make the negotiations more open…

Exporters of Russian wheat have cut prices to try to speed up sales abroad before the government possibly introduces curbs to replenish its own stocks and prevent rises in the cost of bread, traders and analysts said on Friday. Russia's grain exports are running at a record high, buoyed by a large crop and a sinking rouble which after dropping 40 percent this year against the dollar has made exports more profitable than domestic sales. On Thursday, Agriculture Minister Nikolai Fyodorov told an agriculture commission in the lower house of parliament that his ministry would consider all options to restrain exports, "except an embargo", and cover domestic demand.

A growing number of organizations are turning to eLearning courses to ensure employees are properly trained to perform duties safely and efficiently. Marine Testing Solutions (MTS) said its eLearning initiative is helping more key staff members become empowered to make the maritime industry safer and more efficient. In previous years, many owners and operators within the industry were reluctant to introduce formalized training schemes, MTS said, explaining that employees were often given only the most basic information in order to fulfill their role. Now, increasingly strict regulations are entering force within the industry, making that model a thing of the past.

Inchcape Shipping Services (ISS), the world’s leading maritime services provider, is celebrating the awards of ISO 22000:2005 – Food Safety Management System and ISO 9001:2008 for the company’s supply chain operations in Dubai, Mombasa and Mogadishu. Ceremonies recently took place at its global headquarters in the UK and in its regional Head Office in Dubai. As a pre-requisite to fulfilling the requirements of a three year (plus two year option) contract with the United Nations to supply the African Union Mission in Somalia (AMISOM), ISS had to meet a number of operational criteria relating to the procurement, supply chain management, transportation, warehousing and distribution of food to the Mission.

Klϋber Lubrication has received the National Sanitation Foundation (NSF) ISO 21469 certification at its Londonderry, New Hampshire facility. The certification from the NSF ensures food-grade lubricants from Klüber Lubrication are manufactured in a hygienic environment, using both best practices and the safest ingredients. Klüber Lubrication leads the industry with five global locations that are NSF ISO 21469 certified. ISO 21469 specifies hygiene requirements for the formulation, manufacture, use and handling of lubricants which, during manufacture and processing, can come into incidental contact with products and packaging used in the food, food processing, cosmetics, pharmaceutical, tobacco and animal‐feeding‐stuffs industries.

A sample of albacore tuna caught off the shores of Oregon and Washington state have small levels of radioactivity from the 2011 Fukushima nuclear disaster in Japan, researchers said on Tuesday. But authors of the Oregon State University study say the levels are so small you would have to consume more than 700,000 pounds of the fish with the highest radioactive level to match the amount of radiation the average person is annually exposed to in everyday life through cosmic rays, the air, the ground, X-rays and other sources. Still, the findings shed some light about the impact of the meltdown on the Pacific Ocean following the March 2011 tsunami and subsequent power plant disaster, said Delvan Neville, a graduate research assistant at OSU and lead author of the study.

EU shipowners say they applaud the European Parliament’s change of heart on the monitoring of CO2 emissions, lifting the bar of included vessels from 400gt to 5,000gt and above. Previously, the Environment, Public Health and Food Safety (ENVI) Committee of the EP had endorsed the decision of Greek Rapporteur MEP Theodoros Skylakakis to extend the scope of the proposal by including smaller ships of 400 GT or above, as well as more types of emissions. Today however, the EP shifted its position by ultimately rejecting both the extension in terms of GT and additional emissions, thus aligning the scope of its position with the Commission’s proposal of solely monitoring CO2 emissions from ships of 5000GT or above.

Hong Kong’s Center for Food Safety (CFS) of the Food and Environmental Hygiene Department announced today, April 14, that in view of a notification from the Japanese authorities about an outbreak of high-pathogenic H5 avian influenza on a broiler farm in Kumamoto Prefecture, it has banned the import of poultry and poultry products, including poultry eggs, from the prefecture with immediate effect for the protection of Hong Kong's public and animal health. According to Japan's Agricultural Ministry…

Once again, the latest flagship in the MSC fleet is set to become a green paragon in the industry, with leading international classification society Bureau Veritas officially conferring the “7 Golden Pearls” award to MSC Preziosa, the company’s 4th Fantasia class ship. The “7 Golden Pearls” is one of highest awards for cruise vessels in recognition of the specific voluntary attention paid, from design and building to operation, to “Quality Health Safety Environment” (QHSE). The integrated sections that make up the award are: Classification notation “CLEANSHIP 2”, for the three domains of potential air, water and waste pollution. It targets…

Lloyd’s Register has announced the appointment of Chris Finlayson, Chief Executive of BG Group plc, and Ellis Armstrong, ex-CFO of E&P at BP plc, as Non-executive Directors on the board of Lloyd’s Register Group Ltd. Lloyd’s Register Group Ltd (LR) is the wholly-owned operating group of Lloyd’s Register Foundation, a U.K. charity dedicated to supporting the advancement of engineering-related education, and funding research and development that enhances safety of life at sea, on land and in the air.

For the seafarer often spending long periods at sea, meals frequently act as a linchpin to the day's activities. When crews eat a balanced and nutritious diet, they are more contented, more productive and less likely to have accidents. In recognition of this Videotel has partnered with Garrets International Ltd. to launch an important new MLC focused training series, Catering On Board Ship, which aims to help improve the standard of catering on board every class of vessel – from yacht to ocean-going vessel.

Seventy civil service mariners, and approximately 400 Navy, Army and non-governmental organization (NGO) personnel aboard Military Sealift Command hospital ship USNS Mercy (T-AH 20) returned to San Diego Sept. 14. They steamed more than 20,000 miles - nearly the distance of circling the equator - to Indonesia, the Philippines, Vietnam and Cambodia as the lead vessel for Pacific Partnership 2012 (PP12), in a nearly five-month humanitarian and civic assistance mission that resulted in medical treatment for nearly 50,000 people.

The European Community Shipowners' Associations (ECSA) has published a position paper strongly opposing the extension of the scope of the proposed MRV Regulation to include ships of 400 gt or above. The European Commission issued a proposal in June 2013 for a Monitoring, Reporting and Verification Regulation of CO2 emissions from ships calling at EU ports, which lays the foundation for a global measure to reduce CO2 emissions from international shipping. The proposal required ships above 5000 gross tons (GT) to monitor and report the verified amount of CO2 emitted on voyages to…