Sanitation and Temperature Control Are Key to Preventing Food Poisoning, Says IPB University Food Safety Expert

The surge in cases of mass food poisoning in the Free Nutritious Meal (MBG) program taking place in Bogor City has caught the public’s attention. Until now, as of May 15, 2025, 223 students have been poisoned. The Bogor City Government also declared an Extraordinary Event (KLB) status for the incident.

Responding to this incident, IPB University Food Safety Expert, Prof Ratih Dewanti Hariyadi, provided her scientific views regarding the possible causes and efforts to prevent similar incidents in the future. According to her, ready-to-eat foods that are cooked in large quantities have a high level of risk for contamination, especially by pathogenic microorganisms.

“Based on existing reports, ready-to-eat food groups are indeed the main cause of poisoning cases in Indonesia and the world. This type of food is consumed directly after cooking and tends to be more vulnerable than packaged industrially processed food products,” she said.

Prof Ratih explained that the causes of poisoning can come from two main things, namely chemical hazards and microbiological hazards. However, from the available data, the biggest cause comes more from microorganisms such as pathogenic bacteria.

“Bacteria can enter food through unhygienic raw materials, contaminated cooking utensils, workers and improper storage processes. In large-scale ready-to-eat food, this storage factor is very crucial. If food is not immediately cooled after cooking, bacterial spores can reactivate and produce toxins,” she explained.

As a Professor of Food Technology at IPB University, Prof Ratih emphasizes that spore-forming bacteria such as Bacillus cereus or Clostridium perfringens can withstand high temperatures. When hot food is not immediately cooled, these spores can reactivate, grow and/or produce toxins that are harmful to consumers.

“If food is stored for too long at room temperature, for example more than two hours, the risk of contamination is very high. In the context of MBG programs that cook in large quantities, the cooling process of food must be a major concern,” she added.

Prof Ratih mentioned the importance of consistently applying basic hygiene standards and food process control. She underlined two important aspects in large-scale food processing, namely sanitation-hygiene and control of production stages.

“Basic sanitation-hygiene such as cleanliness of equipment, space, and personnel must be applied. In addition, the water used must meet drinking water standards. It is not enough to be clean, but there must also be cleaning procedures that are monitored and evaluated regularly,” she said.

She explained that the lack of sanitation and hygiene implementation allows non-spore-forming pathogens such as pathogenic Escherichia coli, Salmonella, Staphylococcus aureus to contaminate raw food, under-heated food or cause post-heating contamination.

In terms of process control, Prof Ratih pointed out the importance of storing raw materials in appropriate conditions and temperatures, ensuring cooking reaches a minimum temperature of 70°C, and cooling immediately after food is cooked.

Fast cooling, according to her, can be done by portioning food in small sizes, so that the heat drops faster.

“If left in a large basin, the food temperature drops very slowly. This opens up opportunities for spores to reactivate. So the solution is to portion the food immediately in small containers after cooking,” explained Prof Ratih.

In an emergency situation like today, according to Prof Ratih, every implementer of large-scale food programs such as MBG must have standardized SOPs regarding location, building, equipment that can refer to the Standards for Business Activities and Products in the Implementation of Risk-Based Business Licensing in the Health Sector, especially for Group B Jasaboga, hygiene, storage, cooking, and cooling standards. Evaluation and monitoring of the implementation of this SOP must be carried out regularly to ensure sustainable food safety.

“The goal is not only to overcome the incidence of poisoning, but more importantly to prevent it from happening in the future. Education on food safety for all program implementers must also be improved,” she said. (IAAS/FMT)