CASH chairman MacGregor rebuts attacks over salt reduction

Responding to accusations against CASH from Provision Trade Federation (PTF) director general Clare Cheney about “serious safety risks”​​ of food poisoning through encouraging the growth of the pathogen Clostridium botulinum​ in these products were salt reduced more, MacGregor lambasted meat processors for making spurious excuses for not doing more.

MacGregor, who is also professor of cardiovascular medicine at the Wolfson Institute of Preventive Medicine and honorary consultant physician at St George’s Hospital, London, claimed meat processors could develop “innovative techniques”​ to safely reduce salt further. He argued that vested interests, rather than food safety concerns, were the real reason why more had not been done.

‘Stupid remarks’​

“We need to process with caution, but it’s not helped by stupid remarks that we don’t care about Clostridium botulinum,”​ said MacGregor. “Obviously we are aware of that and we need to be cautious, but we think that an innovative processed meat industry could easily achieve these​ [2012 salt reduction] targets.”​

MacGregor attributed a large part of the problem to smaller meat processors not controlling their processes very well, with the result that they were adding far too much salt. However, he also suggested that the industry’s use of salt helped with water retention, which helped to bulk out ham and cured meats. “If they reduce the salt they are not able to add as much water and that is a major factor.”​

Because of the failure of supermarkets​ and those supplying them to achieve the 2012 salt reduction targets for ham and other cured meats, it is believed that the government is not going to set even tougher targets for 2014 and they would remain at the 2012 for the time being.

Meat processors​

MacGregor, however, believes that meat processors could and should reduce salt levels even further. “The point is, if they are sticking to the 2012 targets that means they think they can achieve them,”​ he said.

“There may be some difficulties and they have to use innovative techniques but the fact is we think it is possible to achieve most of those targets. We need to be careful and we are certainly not going to say look you just reduce this without any thought about it. But a large number of the products are sterile and they ignore this.”​

Trade bodies saw it as their duty to defend the interests of their worst performing member companies, said MacGregor. But, he added: “If you can put a man on the moon, you can produce a meat product with less salt in it. And in Finland, there were certainly a lot of experiments showing you could reduce the salt in meat products by using potassium.”​