Public Funding for Wynnstay Group P.L.C.

The project brings together a multi-disciplinary consortium comprising key industry innovators in the UK lamb supply chain working with Aberystwyth University to develop a commercial system for the in-abattoir detection of contamination of carcasses by faecal and gut matter. This contamination has the potential to cause food waste through spoilage and reduced shelf-life, also contributing to the spread of disease-causing organisms. The fluorescence based technology, patented by Aberystwyth University has been developed to the stage where it requires industrial design, testing and demonstration. The consortium will produce an automated machine (C-DeS), capable of detecting contamination in lamb processing (extendable to beef) and integrate it into an abattoir work-flow. The project will then verify the operation of the C-DeS machine and calibrate it to feeding regimes and the thresholds of contamination to make it a useful addition to meat processing operations.

Campylobacter is the most common cause of food borne-illness in the UK. An EU baseline study estimated prevelance in broilers of 75 percent and in boiler carcasses of 86 percent (ESFA, 2011). It is responsible for over 80 deaths p.a. in the UK, over 65 percent of which is derived from campylobacter infected chicken (FSA, 2011). This project will develop two main intervention strategies on the farmand slaughterhouse to reduce the burden of Campylobacter in the UK poultry industry. This is particularly timely due to the recent targets released by the FSA to reduce the proportion of high contaminated carcasses from 27 to 10 percent by 2015. The strategies are based on dietary supplements aimed at reducing Campylobacter survival in the gut (novel anti-microbials); and deployment of novel screening technologies to increase contamination detection on cracasses in the slaughterhouse (flourescent faecal markers).