The government is tapping the use of locally-developed detection systems for food contaminants like E. coli and salmonella as part of its effort to comply with international food safety standards.

The National Meat Inspection Service (NMIS) of the Department of Agriculture (DA) is adopting the polymerase chain reaction (PCR)-based detection kit developed by the University of the Philippines-Los Baños National Institute of Molecular Biology and Biotechnology (NIMBB) which will substantially bring down cost of this function of food safety.

Ronnie Violanta, development manager/officer of the NIMBB, said that a substantially discounted price of only P180 per tube can be taken advantage of by DA institutions like NMIS and the Department of Health’s Bureau of Food and Drug Industry when using these kits. Imported detection kits cost more than P1,200 per tube.

The detection kits involve a DNA amplification system that uses PCR, a technique that can enlarge the size of poisonous microorganisms that are not visible to the naked eye but whose presence can be detected with PCR.

It is concerned about detecting four bacteria that can be dangerous to the human health or even fatal. One of these is the E. coli which is a generally harmless group of bacteria found in the gastrointestinal strain tract of human and animal but which has a strain called E. coli 0157:H7 which causes diarrhea and infections of the urogenital tract.