EVALUATION OF GOOD PRACTICE CONDITIONS IN COLLECTING AND TRANSPORT OF RAW MILK

Abstract

Collecting and transport of bulk raw milk is one of the extremely important stages for maintaining the milk quality in the productive chain of dairy products. The lack of hygienic cares at this phase of the productive process can cause many undesirable changes in the final product. The aim of this paper is the analysis of good practice conditions in collecting and transport of bulk raw milk at a cooling station situated in Cunha Porã City, Santa Catarina State, Brazil. The transport hygienic conditions were analyzed considering four items of hygienic conditions of the equipments and five items of personal hygienic conditions, totalizing 32 and 40 evaluated items respectively. Among the 32 items of the equipments’ hygienic conditions and the 40 items of personal hygienic conditions, 19 (59,6%) and 28 (70,0%) respectively were in accordance with the specific legal requirements as established by Normative Instruction n. 51/2002 (Annex VI – Technical Rule of refrigerated raw milk collecting and its bulk transport). The milk temperature in the tank was also analyzed at the rural property and when it arrived at the cooling station. Tests of alizarol and Dornic titatrable acidity were also done and the results were appropriated to the Brazilian legislation standards. The results show that, even though some quality parameters are proper to the legal standards, there is a need of adapting to the good practice requirements at the collecting and transport of bulk raw milk.