SPRINGDALE — About 40 of the 130 workers laid off earlier this month have been rehired to work at Cargill’s Springdale processing facility, according to spokesman Michael Martin.
He said the workers were called back to fill open positions, but the plant’s ground turkey production remains shuttered.
The plant halted ground turkey production Sept. 12 following two consecutive salmonella incidents linked to one death and 129 reported illnesses across the country.
Martin said the company is exploring potentially promising technologies to better detect food-borne pathogens as it works closely with the federal government’s food safety division.
“There is still no target date for resuming ground turkey production at Springdale,” Martin said.
The food safety glitch is costing Cargill about $2.4 million a week in lost production.
By The Numbers
Turkey Facts
• 50 percent: Amount of ground turkey that can test positive for salmonella and still pass federal inspection.
• 165 degrees: Internal temperature for fully cooked turkey burgers needed to kill salmonella.
• 36 million: Pounds of ground turkey recalled by Cargill in August linked to Salmonella Heidelberg pathogen.
• $17 million: Estimated value of Cargill’s lost ground turkey production since Sept. 12.
Source: Staff Report
The Springdale plant was one of two Cargill facilities to make ground turkey products, leaving a gap between customer orders and Cargill’s supply.
“Our goal is to resume ground turkey production at Springdale as soon as possible, so we are not retooling to produce different products in lieu of ground turkey,” Martin said. “We have not increased whole bird production because there is no need — we typically process all available turkey inventory and have no surplus birds.”
He said Cargill is honoring its commitments to contract growers, despite not producing ground turkey in Springdale.
The plant, when at full production, processes 7 million pounds of finished turkey products each week ranging from whole birds to turkey breasts to ground products.
The Salmonella Heidelberg outbreak could have happened to any poultry processor of live birds because the pathogen coexists among bird populations, according to Frank Jones, consultant with Performance Poultry in Springdale.
Advocates for improved food safety standards say poultry lobbyists have fought tighter government testing protocol through the years, which has left plants using obsolete systems creating a wide margin of error.
Chris Waldrop, director of food policy at the Consumer Federation, said the testing standards are too low for ground turkey product. Now with pending federal budget restraints, he said the agencies overseeing food safety are likely stretched too thin, which is why the recalls are mounting.
The need for faster, yet highly reliable processes to detect pathogens has never been greater given the recent deadly food outbreaks, according to Paul Repetto, chief executive officer of Crystal Diagnostics.
His Ohio-based company has developed a method of testing that can detect multiple pathogens in less than 30 minutes using liquid crystals. The process is being beta-tested with leading food companies in the field and in laboratories this fall.
While the process sounds promising, Martin said more validation would be necessary before its use could be adopted.