Ontario’s Clēan Works has won a prestigious award for food safety from an international organization representing more than 70 countries.
The International Association for Food Protection (IAFP), with over 4,300 members involved in food safety, has announced that Clēan Works is this year’s winner of its Food Safety Innovation Award which goes to “an organization for creating a new idea, practice, or product that has had a positive impact on food safety.”
“We are honoured to receive this award from such a prestigious organization as the IAFP,” said Mark VanderVeen, president of Clēan Works. “We never anticipated that the sanitizing technology developed in our small apple business would have the potential to significantly impact the food industry.”
Clēan Works, a Canadian company based in the Niagara Region, has developed a new process to clean food without using water. This represents a paradigm shift in how food products are cleaned. The new technology is attracting interest from the agri-food industry.
The IAFP award involves a plaque and $2,500 honorarium sponsored by Walmart, and will be formally presented at the IAFP annual meeting running from July 21-24 in Louisville, Kentucky. It is considered the world’s leading conference dedicated to food safety, will include more than 1,250 presentations, and will attract over 3,600 professionals in food safety from industry, academia and government.
The process developed by Clēan Works, called Clēan Verification, kills harmful pathogens and mold, and helps prevent contaminants from entering the water system (see our NicheTV April news video on this process). While water alone is only around 50 per cent effective, this process is up to 99.9 per cent effective under specific conditions. It has been validated by the Food Science Department at the University of Guelph, Canada’s leading agri-food institution.
“I think of Clēan Verification as a firewall between the field and the dinner plate,” said Dr. Keith Warriner, a University of Guelph food scientist and an authority in this field.
The method is organic and waterless, and can take less than 30 seconds. It uses ultraviolet light and vaporized hydrogen peroxide to kill up to 99.9 per cent of pathogens like Listeria, based on Clēan Works’ controlled operating procedures. It also allows for compliance with regulations and can extend the shelf life of food products by up to 25 per cent.
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