Knowledge and attitudes towards food safety among Canadian dairy producers

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Abstract

The Canadian dairy industry has recently begun implementing an on-farm food-safety (OFFS) program called Canadian Quality Milk (CQM). For CQM to be effective, producers should be familiar with food-safety hazards in their industry and have an adequate understanding of on-farm good production practices that are necessary to ensure safe food. To assess their knowledge and attitudes towards food safety, a postal questionnaire was administered to all (n = 10,474) Canadian dairy producers enrolled in dairy herd-improvement organizations in 2008. The response rate was 20.9% (2185/10,474). Most producers (88.7%) reported that they or their families consume unpasteurized milk from their bulk milk tanks and 36.3% indicated that consumers should be able to purchase unpasteurized milk in Canada. Producers who reported completion of a dairy-health management course (OR = 0.74, 95% CI: 0.60, 0.92) and participation in CQM (OR = 0.79, 95% CI: 0.64, 0.97) were less likely to support the availability of unpasteurized milk for consumers, while organic producers (OR = 2.10, 95% CI: 1.27, 3.47), younger producers (aged <30) and producers with smaller herds were more likely to favour this practice. Two-thirds of producers (66.7%) were concerned that antimicrobial resistance (AMR) might preclude successful treatment of sick cattle. Producers who completed a dairy-health management course (OR = 1.37, 95% CI: 1.11, 1.69), organic producers (OR = 2.00, 95% CI: 1.09, 3.69) and producers from Quebec compared to each other province were more likely to indicate concern about AMR.

Most producers reported that Salmonella (74.2%) and Escherichia coli (73.0%) could be transmitted through contaminated beef or milk to humans, while most were not sure or did not think that Brucella (70.3%) and Cryptosporidium (88.5%) could be transmitted via these routes. Most producers did not perceive that any type of farm visitor has a high risk of introducing infectious agents into their herds. Producers rated veterinarians as very knowledgeable about OFFS (90.9% answered 4 or 5 on a five-point scale) and a favoured (73.1%) source of information about food safety. In contrast, only 13.2% and 30.2% of producers, respectively, indicated that consumers and government personnel are knowledgeable about OFFS. Targeted continuing education for dairy producers in Canada should address the major gaps in knowledge and attitudes towards food safety identified in this study, and veterinarians should be included as key knowledge-transfer informants.

Introduction

In Canada, approximately 11 million cases of foodborne disease occur each year, and acute gastroenteritis is estimated to cost CAD $3.7 billion annually (Thomas et al., 2008). Dairy cattle are an important reservoir of Campylobacter, Salmonella, Shiga toxin-producing Escherichia coli (STEC), Listeria monocytogenes and other bacterial pathogens that can cause foodborne disease. These pathogens have been recovered with various frequencies from dairy-cattle faeces, bulk milk tanks and the dairy-farm environment (Jayarao and Henning, 2001, Murinda et al., 2002, Van Kessel et al., 2004, Srinivasan et al., 2005, Karns et al., 2007). Although most milk sold for public consumption in North America is pasteurized, outbreaks due to the consumption of unpasteurized milk (Peterson, 2003, CDC, 2007, Denny et al., 2008), inadequately pasteurized milk (Fahey et al., 1995) and cheeses made from unpasteurized milk (Honish et al., 2005, CDC, 2007) continue to occur. Antimicrobial residues and antimicrobial-resistant bacteria from milk and milk products can also pose potential health risks to consumers (Katz and Brady, 2000, Straley et al., 2006).

International authorities have recommended an integrated, farm-to-fork approach to ensuring safe food (OIE Animal Production Food Safety Working Group, 2006). Accordingly, major livestock commodity groups in Canada developed their own on-farm food-safety (OFFS) programs that are partially based on hazard-analysis critical control-point (HACCP) principles (Rajić et al., 2007). The Canadian dairy industry's program, called Canadian Quality Milk (CQM), is currently in the implementation stages, with mandatory producer registration deadlines that vary by province and range from 2007 in Prince Edward Island (PEI) to 2012 in Quebec (Dairy Farmers of Canada, 2007, Rajić et al., 2007).

Successful implementation of CQM requires that dairy producers are aware of the food-safety hazards associated with their industry and their role in ensuring safe food production. Previous research in the USA has shown that dairy producers are knowledgeable about Salmonella and concerned about antimicrobial resistance (AMR) and antibiotic residues but lack knowledge of Listeria and the health risks of consuming unpasteurized milk (Wilson, 1998, Vanbaale et al., 2003, Hoe and Ruegg, 2006, Jayarao et al., 2006, Raymond et al., 2006). These issues have never been investigated among Canadian dairy producers. Our study objectives were to describe the knowledge and attitudes of dairy producers in Canada towards various microbial food-safety issues using a postal questionnaire administered in the early stages of CQM implementation. We also evaluated associations between producer characteristics and their attitudes towards the consumption of unpasteurized milk and AMR.

Section snippets

Questionnaire design

We developed a questionnaire to assess the knowledge and attitudes towards food safety and use of good production practices (GPP) by dairy producers in Canada (supplementary online material). Initial questions were developed by authors J.S. and J.M., and feedback was received from five bovine clinicians at the Atlantic Veterinary College, Canada. The questionnaire was then administered as a pilot survey to 26 bovine practitioners in Canadian Maritime provinces in 2006. Based on these results,

Producer and herd characteristics

After removing 12 blank questionnaires, the final response percentage was 20.9% (2185/10,474). The average litres of milk picked up per farm every 2 days was 2993 (standard deviation [SD] = 2335). The average herd size of respondents was 62 (SD = 179), which was significantly lower than the DHI average in some provinces (Table 1). The percentage of herds with >50 cows was lower for respondents in all provinces (Table 1). Respondent demographic information (age, gender, organic status and herd size)

Discussion

The response percentage in this study (20.9%) is comparable to previous postal questionnaires of dairy producers, which have ranged widely from 9% to 71.7% (Rauff et al., 1996, Payne et al., 1999, Vanbaale et al., 2003, Hoe and Ruegg, 2006, Matak et al., 2006, Kaylegian et al., 2008). Although we tried to increase the response rate in this study (e.g. use of a monetary incentive and reminder letter), other methods known to be effective in increasing responses to postal questionnaires could not

Conclusion

We found that dairy producers in Canada have positive attitudes towards food safety and are knowledgeable about certain microbial agents (e.g. Salmonella). However, we also identified gaps in awareness of Brucella, Cryptosporidium and the risks of introducing infectious agents from farm visitors. There is a need for increased communication and knowledge exchange between dairy producers and other industry stakeholders (such as consumers and government personnel) to increase trust and

Conflict of interest

We have no conflicts to declare.

Acknowledgements

We thank CanWest DHI and Valacta for their participation and for mailing questionnaires and letters to producers; Ian Weinrich for development of the electronic database; Heather Desjardins for assistance with survey printing; Jessica Fung, Amanda Waldner, and Corinne Sawatzky for data entry and validation; Jean-Francois Tetreault and Jocelyn Dubuc for translation of the questionnaire; Erica Pufall for translation of open-ended responses; Ann Godkin and Lucie Dutil for their input on the

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