Abstract
In Nigeria, the National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC) guides the inspection and production of beef meat and prescribes the good practices pertinent to beef products’ handling, processing, and packaging. Specifically, good hygiene practice (GHP) assures beef product safety and consumer protection, whereas good storage practice (GSP) assures the continuity of hygiene activities within the storage stages. Relevant literature about butchers’ knowledge and perception of good hygiene and storage practices within Nigeria slaughterhouses remains scant. This current study, therefore, assessed butchers’ knowledge and perception of good hygiene and storage practices through a cattle slaughterhouse case analysis. The selected cattle slaughterhouse serves the increasingly thriving Nsukka beef market in Enugu State, Nigeria. Content validation was utilised to authenticate the questionnaire items, which were administered face-to-face to the respondents (i.e., the butchers). The questionnaire included a total of 30 questions. The results showed that the butchers were male (Freq. = 100%, n = 50), acquired their knowledge informally (Freq. = 88%, n = 44), were largely with more than 5 years of slaughterhouse experience (Freq. = 82%, n = 41), and were strongly (p < 0.0001) familiar with good hygiene (Freq. = 96%, n = 48) and storage (Freq. = 98%, n = 49) practices. The butchers provided examples that demonstrated knowledge and perception aspects of GHP and GSP. The perception aspects of GHP and GSP were correlated more, compared to knowledge and knowledge versus perception. Very conscious of their knowledge and perception of good hygiene and storage practices, the butchers herein have to strive for continuous improvement in their slaughterhouse activities to assure beef quality and consumer safety.
Highlights
Introduction published maps and institutional affilGlobally, the demand for beef is continually on the rise, providing a highly desirable eating experience, even in developing countries [1]
Butchers within the Nsukka slaughterhouse were the target population, who by experience, expertise, and delivery of services are typically representative of other slaughterhouses in terms of size, volume, as well as workforce, situated in various communities/local government area (LGA) around the state and around the entire country
The male control at the slaughterhouse of this study is consistent with findings reported elsewhere [24,25,26,27,28,29]
Summary
For of the Theand schematic of the body current study, from the identification emphasis, this current work was designed to assess Nigerian butchers’ knowledge and perarea/target population and development of the research instrument to delineati ception of good hygiene and storage practices via a case analysis of a cattle slaughterhouse. Specific slaughterhouse was selected because of its important role, from receiving and slaughtering the cattle and processingtoand packaging the beef to supplying emphasis, this current work was designed assess. Ethical ApprovalEssentially, this specific slaughterhouse was selected because important role, from andnot slaughtering the study cattlefor and pack. The approval to use the research instrument for this survey was given by the slaughterhouse association. The butchers’ participation at this study was voluntary
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