Here's a Timeline provided by the
Des Moines Register:
http://www.desmoinesregister.com/ar...05/-1/GETPUBLISHED03/Timeline-BPI-controversy
1971: Eldon Roth, CEO of BPI, starts Roth Refrigeration and invents the Roller Press Freeze, which reduces freezing time from three to five days down to two minutes.
1974: Food grade ammonium hydroxide (basically ammonia plus water) is declared safe by the Food and Drug Administration. It is used to produce a number of products such as puddings and baked goods.
1981: BPI builds its first plant, in Amarillo, Texas, that uses the Roller Press Freeze technology and begins making frozen beef.
1988: Builds its second plant, in Finney County, Kan.
1992: Opens its third plant, in Waterloo, Ia.
1994: Begins developing its pH Enhancement System, which is later proven to reduce the number of potential pathogens such as E. coli in beef and ultimately leads to the production of lean, finely textured beef. The system relies on slightly increasing the level of ammonium hydroxide already present in beef to elevate its pH. By combining a small amount (measured in parts per million) of ammonia gas with the naturally occurring moisture in beef, the company produces ammonium hydroxide and reduces the level of pathogens in the product.
1998: Opens its fourth plant, in South Sioux City, Neb.
2001: The Federal Drug Administration and the U.S. Department of Agriculture approve the pH Enhancement System, and BPI begins making pH enhanced lean beef. The process allows beef producers to separate beef fat from meat in a way that would be impossible to do by hand, providing 10 to 12 more pounds of meat per animal.
2002: USDA microbiologist Gerald Zirnstein is credited with first using the term “pink slime” to refer to lean, finely textured beef. Zirnstein uses the term after touring a BPI plant and later emails his peers, saying he doesn’t “consider the stuff to be ground beef,” according to the online news site the Daily.
2007: International Association for Food Protection awards BPI its highest honor, the Black Pearl Award.
Dec. 30, 2009: The New York Times reports that in testing for the school lunch program, E. coli and salmonella pathogens have been found dozens of times in BPI’s meat, challenging claims by the company and the USDA about the effectiveness of the ammonium treatment. Since 2005, E. coli is found three times and salmonella 48 times, including back-to-back incidents in August 2009 in which two 27,000-pound batches are found to be contaminated. The meat was caught before reaching lunch-room trays, the newspaper reports.
January 2012: McDonald’s announces it has stopped using beef treated with ammonium hydroxide in production of its food, a policy the restaurant says started in August 2011.
March 8, 2012: An ABC News investigation finds that 70 percent of the ground beef on store shelves contains lean, finely textured beef, which the report says is often called “pink slime.” The coverage identifies Zirnstein, the former USDA scientist, as a whistle-blower: “It’s not fresh ground beef, it is a substitute,” he says. Social media sites like Facebook, Twitter and an online blog called TheLunchTray.com are soon abuzz about the product, calling for its removal from school lunch programs.
March 15, 2012: The USDA announces it has adjusted requirements so schools can choose whether to order products with or without lean, finely textured beef.
March 26, 2012: BPI announces it is temporarily closing its plants in Texas, Kansas and Iowa, placing 600 people out of work, including 220 in Iowa.
March 28, 2012: Iowa Gov. Terry Branstad announces he has formed a coalition of governors to fight the “baseless media scare.” He also appears in a news conference with former Iowa Gov. and current U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack to defend use of the product.
March 29, 2012: Branstad tours the BPI plant in South Sioux City, Neb., with Texas Gov. Rick Perry, Kansas Gov. Sam Brownback, Nebraska Lt. Gov. Rick Sheehy and South Dakota Lt. Gov. Matt Michels.
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This timeline say that the FDA and USDA approved the process and BPI begins making pH enhanced lean beef in
2001. That would be only 11 yrs in food chain. I'm confused though because other articles have said that it was approved by the undersecretary of agriculture in 1991. Can anyone help clarify what happened on these different dates? When did LFTB start entering the food chain, 1991 or 2001?
