Bacteria—25 million per cubic centimeter.
It was also stated that pulp which was to be converted into catsup should not contain more than half this number of micro-organisms, as allowance must be made for the increase due to concentration.
The fact that pulp and catsup can be made to keep within these limits has been demonstrated a number of times, but I have yet to see a season’s run, all of which, or even 50% of which, will come within these limits. It is easy enough to run individual batches which by careful supervision over the sorters will have a very low count of molds, etc., but regardless of the precautions a man will take to safeguard himself, there is almost bound to be at some time in the season some manufactured goods that will run over these limits. The packer, however, should keep these limits in mind as an ideal to work to, not on one batch, but on a season’s run, but it is not an easy goal to attain, and in my opinion the government doesn’t expect it to be attained very often. The packer has to contend with a glut of tomatoes in September almost every year; it is difficult to get good help to do the sorting and to supervise the sorting; unfavorable weather conditions make the tomatoes moldy and full of rot; delayed shipments come in in very bad condition; machinery breaks down at the most unexpected times, and necessitates delay in the factory at critical moments; the help get careless about the cleanliness of the equipment, and run through some goods before the unclean parts are discovered; accidents occur in the power plant and the plant may have to run on inadequate steam for two or three days, etc., etc. Every packer has been up against these things, but as a rule pure food inspectors have not, and they are sometimes slow to appreciate the packers’ side of the case. This is particularly true of local health inspectors who have had no experience with food manufacturing problems, and sometimes permit a packer to receive a lot of unfavorable and unjust newspaper publicity.
The heads of the government pure food departments, that is, the high officials of the Bureau of Chemistry, intend to play very fair with canners, and it must be admitted that they will go a long way with a man who is making an honest and determined effort to pack his goods in the right way, and who is taking advantage of the opportunities he has to post himself on modern methods of packing his products. The packer should remember that the product of a plant that is run in an unsanitary way is always under suspicion by the government, and that shipments from these plants are the ones which are apt to be watched by the government agents. The government can go into any railroad office, whether government or privately controlled, ask the agent to show them the bills of lading on shipments, and notify their inspector at destination to take samples of the car on arrival.
Getting back to the subject of established limits for micro-organisms, in the fall of 1916 the government authorities named the point at which they were recommending condemnation proceedings. The notice, which was issued by the Bureau of Chemistry of the Department of Agriculture, stated that at the present time they were not advising condemnation of tomato products unless the micro-organisms exceeded at least one of the following counts:
Molds in 66% of the microscopic fields.
Yeasts and Spores—125 in 1/60th cubic millimeter.
Bacteria—100 million per cubic centimeter.
This is a long way from the limit of 25 on each count, which the government formerly stated should not in their opinion be exceeded. At the same time, however, Mr. Howard of the Bureau of Chemistry made a statement to the effect that they still considered it possible under manufacturing conditions to make these products to comply with the original 25–25–25 limit, and that it was their intention to approach the original limits more closely. It should not be understood that the government thinks that products which run below the higher limits are good enough, because they decidedly do not, but at present they are not recommending for condemnation those products which run below these figures.