Use of non-chlorine sanitizer in eliminating bacterial and fungal pathogens from betel leaves - a field level study.

The presence of foodborne pathogen in betel leaf represents a major threat from the public health perspective and is an important export obstacle for South East Asian countries causing huge economical loss to the betel leaf farmers. Hence, to comply with national and international food safety requirements, use of non-chlorine sanitizer and low-cost personal hygiene & awareness tools for producing safe betel leaf were evaluated in this study. The study results demonstrated that microbial safety measures of the field soil and irrigation water used, and restriction in domestic animal entry into the field were able to produce microbiologically safe betel leaf. In addition, washing the harvested fresh betel leaves with 0.01% non-chlorine sanitizers provided adequate microbial safety of the fresh betel leaf. Thus, this approach could be applicable in the field for safe fresh betel leaf production for the consumers. All rights reserved, Elsevier.