Abstract
Consumer's preference and microbial inspections on fresh raw beef were carried out to understand the actual market status in Gwanju, Korea. Over 15 questions on questionnaire by 1,111 randomly selected respondents between April and May in 2011, results showed 65.5% positive on eating fresh raw beef, 63.8% negative on good hygiene condition of fresh raw beef, and 72.5% positive on the secure of the hygiene-safety for priority program, respectively. For microbial inspections, a total of 302 samples were collected from fresh raw beef purchased from slaughterhouse (n=122), transport (n=69) and consumer (n=81) stage, from lettuce (n=30) at consumer stage. The aerobic plate count (APC), E. coli count and food borne bacteria such as Salmonella spp., Listeria monocytogenes, Staphylococcus(S.) aureus and E. coli O157:H7 were tested in the samples. As results, the level of count on APC of fresh raw beef ranged $6{\times}10^1{\sim}1.8{\times}10^5CFU/g$ from slaughterhouse, $2{\times}10^2{\sim}8.3{\times}10^5CFU/g$ from transport stage and $1{\times}10^2{\sim}4{\times}10^5CFU/g$ from consumer stage. The level of count on E. coli of fresh raw beef ranged $1{\sim}9{\times}10^1CFU/g$ from slaughterhouse, $1{\sim}7{\times}10CFU/g$ from transport stage and $1{\sim}5.5{\times}10CFU/g$ from consumer stage. In total, 26 S. aureus were isolated, 10 (14.5%) from fresh raw beef at transport stage, 12 (14.8%) from fresh raw beef and 4 (13.3%) from lettuce at consumer stage. Enterotoxin of S. aureus was not detected among 26 isolates. All S. aureus isolates were typed using a DiversiLab$^{TM}$ rep-PCR system for genetic similarity test, showing over 95% of genetic relationship amon isolates.