Our first day of school!

Ciao!

We just completed our first day of the iMoves summer program and it has been wonderful meeting the rest of the Italian and American students participating in the program. After meeting at the “bar” for a coffee and a pastry, we started heading into the lecture hall when the power went out in the majority of Legnaro, the comune in the Province of Padova, where the Agripolis campus for the University is located. Due to the blackout, we had our morning lecture outside, which was a great change of pace from what we are used to! Thankfully, we found a shady spot under the trees because it has been HOT and humid here and it looks like it is going to stay that way for the remainder of our time here.

Now is probably a good time to explain where exactly we are in Italy! As I said before, the veterinary campus of the University of Padova is located in the comune (equivalent to a township or municipality) of Legnaro in the Province of Padua. This is around 19 miles southwest of Venice and 7 miles from the city center of Padua proper. I’ll include a photo of the location below. We have a trip planned to Venice on Friday to visit a seafood distributer and may explore more of the iconic city this upcoming weekend! We need to take advantage of the fact that it is just an short train ride from where we are!

Back to today’s lecture, we were taught by Prof.Dr. Frans J.M. Smulders DVM who is a member and one of the founders of the European College of Veterinary Public Health and based out of University of Vienna in the Institute of Meat Hygiene and Food Security. The morning lecture focused on the philosophy of animal welfare and the complicated nature of how to define and quantify welfare and enact change. He then explained the chain of events that occur after receiving a “mandate” (specific question) from the European commission and the risk assessment methodology carried out by EFSA (European Food Safety Authority) and how that can then translate into legislative changes.

In the afternoon, Dr. Smulders changed topics to the contamination of food and various methods of decontamination of food. This lesson included a video depicting various methods used in the EU for the slaughter of pigs and discussed the contamination levels at various points along the slaughter line. He explained the principle of Ishikawa diagram which is represents a systematic approach used in quality assurance programs, aimed to look at every aspect of the slaughter process including material, manpower, machinery, microorganisms, and the methods used, in order to identify the problem from every possible aspect. We then went through various control strategies used throughout the world in order to minimize contamination or decontaminate various food products.

To end our first day in the program, the Italian faculty hosted a cocktail hour complete with apertifs and finger foods which allowed all the students and faculty involved in the program to further socialize and get to know each other as we continue this fantastic journey!

Be sure to stop by again to see what we are up to next!

For now, Buona notte!