In food safety policy, a zero tolerance standard generally means that if a potentially dangerous substance (whether microbiological, chemical, or other) is present in or on a product, that product will be considered adulterated and unfit for human consumption.
Fecal contamination
In the United States meat and poultry inspection program, "zero tolerance" usually refers to the
USDA
The United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) is the federal executive department responsible for developing and executing federal laws related to farming, forestry, rural economic development, and food. It aims to meet the needs of com ...
rule that permits no visible signs of fecal contamination (feces) on meat and poultry carcasses.
USDA requires that any time such fecal contamination is detected, it must be removed from the carcass.
At issue is how this rule has been applied and enforced by USDA in meat and poultry plants.
For a number of years, poultry producers have been permitted to either rinse off or cut away such contamination, but beef producers have only been permitted to trim it with a knife—which they argue costs them money in lost product weight and imposes a requirement that poultry producers do not have to meet.
The policy
jargon
Jargon is the specialized terminology associated with a particular field or area of activity. Jargon is normally employed in a particular communicative context and may not be well understood outside that context. The context is usually a partic ...
for this debate is "
wash versus trim".
USDA early in 1997 clarified its zero tolerance rule for poultry; a year earlier it gave beef plants permission to use a new high-temperature vacuuming method to remove fecal contamination in lieu of cutting it off.
References
* {{Congressional Research Service, article = Report for Congress: Agriculture: A Glossary of Terms, Programs, and Laws, 2005 Edition, url = https://web.archive.org/20110810044532/http://ncseonline.org/nle/crsreports/05jun/97-905.pdf, author=Jasper Womach
United States Department of Agriculture