Sanitary risk assessment for caiman meat quality in Central Amazon

Abstract

Determining caiman meat quality is a major problem when establishing the production chain of wild populations. In Brazil, there are no protocols for this type of meat. The slaughter and processing were performed using a simplified, traditional floating raft system and a water treatment system that used both filtration and chemicals. The animals were caught using a hook, harpoon, resting pole, and cable snare. The wild caimans of two species (Melanosuchus niger and Caiman crocodilus) were captured in the region of the Piagaçu-Purus Sustainable Development Reserve in Central Amazon during three harvesting events. After each event, we progressively improved the meat-processing protocol. Microbiological testing of the meat was performed as described in norms and Brazilian legislation for fish meat. As a result, we achieved improvements in the sanitary quality of the meat of the killed animals for 57%, 76.5% and 100% of the samples obtained during the first, second, and third harvesting events, respectively. There were significant differences in the microbiological quality of the meat, with a reduction in the disapproval of the samples. The process of capturing animals, the cable snare, and the restraining pole were the factors that least affected the quality of the meat; in addition, animals between 81 and 100 cm of CRC had a lower risk of microbiological contamination. We can conclude that health surveillance activities, such as hand hygiene when handling meat, improvements in water quality, selection of animals of the most appropriate size for slaughter, and capture by less invasive methods can reduce the potential for microbiological contamination of the meat contribute to decrease the potential for microbiological contamination of meat.