Aussie experts at livestock training

Livestock company Mawashi conducted a round of advanced training programmes for staff with industry experts from Australia holding seminars and demonstrations on livestock handling and sanitation. The initiative was led by Dr Omer Ahmed Abdul Hameed, head of the quality and health section at Mawashi, in partnership with Meat & Livestock Australia (MLA) consultants Blythe Calnan (Livestock Consulting) and Peter Dundan (Manager, Livestock Services, MEA region). The training sessions, which were held onsite at Mawashi’s abattoirs in Abu Hamour, were attended by hundreds of staff members from across the board. Ideal Sanitation Operation Practices joined hands with Mawashi’s quality department to add key insights into the highly-sensitive cleaning and chemical handling safety processes. “We have come a long way in our quality, hygiene and safety journey here at Mawashi owing to the clear vision of our CEO and MD, Ahmed Nasser Sraiya al-Kaabi, to become the guardians of food safety in the country. This also underlines our steadfast commitment to be a key member of the Qatar National Food Security Programme whereby we look at ourselves as not only providers of food resources, but also as vanguards of the highest quality practices,” said Dr Hameed. “The training programmes that we regularly carry out at Mawashi, together with our future quality initiatives such as ISO accreditations, are a continuation of our efforts to become Qatar’s leading meat and food provider.” Mawashi is currently undergoing a series of audits and developments in its aim to bag the ISO 9001:2008 certification for Quality Manager Systems and ISO 22000:2005 for Food Safety Management Systems, two key pillars of the company’s strategy in the Qatari market. The company has also introduced a manual covering the entire spectrum of operations, including safety and hygiene, animal care, health and others. Additionally, the quality team is planning an industry workshop to look into food-borne diseases. Mawashi is gearing up to inaugurate its refurbished abattoirs in Abu Hamour following considerable investments to upgrade existing systems, facilities and machinery and introduce new measures for hygiene, safety and quality.