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Cleaning & Sanitizing Blueberry Harvesters
4 Plays1 minute ago
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Transcript
Introduction to Produce Safety Podcast
00:00:00
Speaker
Hello and welcome to the Agri-Food Safety Produce Bites podcast, where we discuss all things produce safety and dive into the rules and regulations surrounding the Food Safety Modernization Act Produce Safety Rule.
00:00:13
Speaker
I'm Phil Tocco. I'm with Michigan State University Extension. I am housed in Jackson, but cover the entire state with respect to on-farm produce safety. Thanks for having me on the show today.
Guest Introductions
00:00:25
Speaker
i'm Dr. Renee Holland. My background is pretty intensive with microbiology and plant pathology, bachelor's of science at Clemson University Microbiology and master's and PhD at University of Georgia in plant pathology. I really enjoy being outdoors and working with growers and conducting field research.
00:00:48
Speaker
Are you from a farm background? So my family, we've always lived out in the country and I come from a line of sharecroppers and ah really enjoy being out in the country and being in that rural atmosphere.
00:01:05
Speaker
i ended up kind of falling into microbiology, had a lot of interest in the things that are unseen back in high school and college. And i ended up doing a lot of laboratory microbiology and really enjoyed that actually. But I noticed there were no windows in the labs. I didn't get to get outside much. So that's how I got more interested in agriculture.
00:01:27
Speaker
And of course, as you know, we we eat every day. So that's always of interest to a lot of folks. That's awesome. Yeah, I definitely can see that being a ah draw.
Beginning in Blueberry Production
00:01:38
Speaker
So now I'm really curious about how you got interested in the line of research around over the row harvester, blueberry harvesters and keeping them clean. Right. So i started an extension agent position. i was an area extension agent specialized in commercial blueberry production. And I started that role back in 2013 did that for about nine years. Really enjoyed that. That was with the University of Georgia Extension and working a lot with growers.
Food Safety Across the Supply Chain
00:02:09
Speaker
And at the time, the produce safety rule was coming out and there was more regulation and legislation around
00:02:16
Speaker
how we handled produce and what types of cleaning and sanitization steps needed to be taken. So they were really starting to formalize that. And so there some more roles that came out. I know Georgia Department of Agriculture started having some particular roles around food safety and trying to help growers come into compliance at the farm level. Obviously, food safety is a lot more than just with the growers and at the farm level level. There's a whole supply chain, including transportation, time at the grocery stores, how the consumer handles a product when they get home. So I just want to make that very clear that this is just the first step, that there are several steps where food safety needs to be maintained, you to have a successful product where you reduce the risk of foodborne illness outbreak.
00:03:12
Speaker
Yeah, that makes sense.
Research on Harvest Machinery Cleaning
00:03:13
Speaker
I mean, certainly what's what's interesting to me is that this work is is coming out at around the same time as as other people being interested in harvest machinery and its potential role in outbreaks like. There's a lot of research right now in baby leaf harvesters by Drs. Chanarok and Dr. Michelle Daniluk to try and pinpoint cleaning and sanitizing of baby leaf harvesters and how to do it effectively and efficiently. So that's why I was like, it's sort of in the practical sort of spotlight at this point.
00:03:49
Speaker
Food safety microbiology is a consideration you know, at the home, on your countertop surfaces, people are cleaning and sanitizing. There's also the aspect of hand harvesting.
00:04:01
Speaker
And so when I think about cleaning and sanitization of harvesters. I feel like that is just an area of mitigation that could be a lot more manageable than the fact that there are hand harvesters out there where people are hand picking fruit for fresh produce. And, you know, it's it's much more challenging, I would say, to try to mitigate the food safety there.
00:04:25
Speaker
i think overall, therere it's much bigger than food safety as well. the The growers are trying to consider the quality of the fruit too. So there's been tons of research poured into, you know, how to modify the surfaces of the over-the-row harvesters to to have like less bruising on the fruit, to have better fruit quality.
00:04:47
Speaker
I've had several growers tell me that they they really get a better grade on their fruit, you know, if they have nice cleaning and sanitization practices, um you know. And so that's extra motivation for the growers to do that.
00:05:02
Speaker
I think it's, you know, with the hand pickers, it can always be a challenge making sure they have to make sure they have hand washing stations and sanitizers and all of that. But we have come a long way. and I'm really proud of the growers on a national level in terms of all the programs they've put into place to to mitigate risk of foodborne illness.
00:05:24
Speaker
I'm curious what the current standard practices is in in cleaning over the row harvesters at this point. Well, often they will take the harvesters back to a main area at the farm where they have yeah access to water and they can use pressure washers to help clean the surfaces. They also have different types of detergents they can use. I did a study where I looked at different types of cleaners and kind of compared, you know, some some that they can kind of get readily, like Dawn is a degreaser type cleanser. I looked at vinegar, I looked at ah the no-rinse contact, food contact cleaner sanitizer, that's kind of a quaternary ammonium type product and kind of marketed ah to the food industry as an all-in-one cleaning sanitizer step. And so there was just so many cleaning agents and it can be overwhelming to the growers.
Effective Cleaning Techniques
00:06:21
Speaker
And i think I just want to touch on the process of cleaning and sanitization is really two steps. We tried to to test an all-in-one step, but of course, as you know, really you have to remove that debris from a surface with cleaners and water, and also the amount of time of rinsing helps.
00:06:43
Speaker
We did find out that after you know a certain period of time of rinsing, it does have diminutive returns, so it's not like you have to stay in front of one spot on the harvester forever, that that doesn't actually help you get the surface any cleaner.
00:07:00
Speaker
so what I'm hearing is you can't sanitize a dirty surface. That's the first thing. Right. um So you have to clean it first. And you mentioned that you looked at a bunch of surfactants. I'm curious, were there any surfactants that stood out as doing a particularly good job?
00:07:17
Speaker
Really what stood out as the best was if you can use hot distilled water or hot water, I think a temperature bump helps.
00:07:29
Speaker
So the soap made no difference is what you're saying. Honestly, as we compared all these different cleaners, the proprietary surfactant blend, the Dawn detergent, the no rinse cleaner sanitizer, the vinegar, there was no difference between using that and distilled water. Wow, that's neat. And really the only difference between using water was just if you could increase the temperature of the water. But logistically, I think that would be very difficult for the growers. But I think there are growers that do try to use that option if they have hot water access when they clean the harvesters. So that does help, you know, with cleaning.
00:08:11
Speaker
But the good news here is that they don't have to go out and buy some particular pricey cleaner to to have good cleaning practices. I think This is kind of known in human microbiology too, with hand washing, that simply friction and rinsing with water can go a long ways.
00:08:29
Speaker
That's a fantastic thing to hear that that from ah a scientific standpoint, just hot water and friction can can do the job. But it sounds too like rinsing played a pretty big role in in actually getting a good final product too, right?
00:08:46
Speaker
Yes. So the rinse time, obviously, as you increase the amount of rinse time, you can remove more soil from these different types of surfaces. And I think it's important to note that with the mechanical harvesters, we're dealing with a lot of different types of surfaces, different capabilities and cleanability.
00:09:05
Speaker
But overall, I think what, you know, we're There's a lot of nice smooth surfaces that these harvester materials are made out of. And so the smoother the surface, the easier for the soil to be removed.
00:09:18
Speaker
In terms of rinse time, i mean, exponentially you can remove more debris from the surface in that first, say 60 seconds. ah You know, you may get a little extra bump if if you're in in front of an area for, say,
00:09:33
Speaker
say a hundred seconds, but past that you're, you're kind of, kind of diminishing return in terms of the amount of soil that you remove. And just so I understand when you're talking about a rinse, you're not talking about doing it with ah a power washer. I'm guessing you're thinking about a low pressure
Cost-Effective Sanitization Methods
00:09:49
Speaker
rinse. Yes.
00:09:50
Speaker
The data i used was on a setting that was more of a low pressure rinse. So, high pressure, i think, you know, that definitely helps, helps a lot. But you just have to be wary that if you get too high on the pressure, you may actually you know stick the debris in a corner in the harvester. So varying varying pressures should help. And you know the good news is that you don't have to have a high pressure washer or two to to wash the harvester. So I think people underestimate the effect of cleaning and sanitization can be relatively low cost.
00:10:28
Speaker
Cool. That's, again, really good to hear that low pressure water actually is effective. Did you do any work with sanitizers? In terms of sanitizers, we just, you know, looked at a water control. we looked at bleach.
00:10:44
Speaker
We looked at a product called Saniday, which is a peroxy acetic acid type product. And also we looked at that no rinse cleaner sanitizer in one type product was just more of like a quaternary ammonium.
00:10:58
Speaker
I think the most challenging group to address was the bacterial group. The the bleach and peroxyacetic acid type products did help reduce the amount of colony forming units compared to the water control.
00:11:16
Speaker
As we move on to the yeast, by far the peroxyacetic acid product was the most effective, but we definitely get a reduction and yeast with the bleach as well.
00:11:31
Speaker
And then as we move down to the fungal representative, the apococcal nigrum, The peroxyacetic acid product again was highly efficacious. There's different brands of these types of products. So I encourage people to read the label.
00:11:47
Speaker
I mean, these are, you know, products that you have to handle carefully and they need to read the label rates and what's kind of recommended there. And, you know, bleach, I never knew how confusing it could actually be. There's so many different instructions for how to use bleach and concentrations for a variety different applications.
00:12:06
Speaker
The peroxyacetic acid product can be highly efficacious against some of these organismal groups, but it can be pretty rough on the equipment but as well. You know, it's kind of a corrosive type material.
00:12:19
Speaker
With sanitizers, it's important for the growers to remember that there's a contact time. Right. it's It's just my pet peeve going into these gyms and they want you to wipe down the the gym equipment with sanitizer.
00:12:33
Speaker
Really, you should spray it, allow a contact time of, say, 60 seconds and then wipe it off. So same thing with the harvesters. Contact time is important and that varies what is needed depending on the sanitizer. But I i say if you do 60 seconds, you're you're pretty safe.
00:12:51
Speaker
Cool. so So definitely when you use sanitizer, it's a good thing. And definitely do that after you've cleaned the surface. Right.
00:13:03
Speaker
Is there anything else you think growers should know about cleaning and sanitizing over the road blueberry harvesters that we haven't already talked about?
Targeted Cleaning Areas
00:13:11
Speaker
Well, we haven't really talked much about the the particular surfaces and the areas in the harvester.
00:13:19
Speaker
Overall, with my initial paper in this area was on microbial hygiene of the different harvester surfaces. And we did find that we would find higher levels kind of in those lower levels of the harvester. So on the lower sidewall of the harvester, the conveyor belts in the harvester,
00:13:38
Speaker
obviously that's a major food contact surface. And so those just tend to collect more debris. So there, there could be more potential that, that, that's a great area to target your cleaning. The, the growers may know them as fish scales, but the catcher plates that go around the base of the plants to catch the berries from the initial rattle of the feeder rods to knock the the ripe berries off. Sure. So those catcher plates can also, a lot of debris can collect there as well. So those are some good targeted areas for cleaning as kind of, you know, if you're in a rush, really target those lower surfaces of the harvester.
Conclusion and Resources
00:14:22
Speaker
Cool. Thank you. That's that's really helpful. Thank you so much, Renee. I really appreciate you taking the time with us. Thank you for having me. Links to anything referenced in this episode can be found in the podcast description.
00:14:36
Speaker
For more produce safety resources, tools, and upcoming trainings, visit the MSU Agri-Food Safety website at gaps.msu.edu. That's G-A-P-S dot M-S-U dot E-D-U. We hope today's episode helped you take another step towards safer produce.