School children served six-year-old meat

It is not known how many children may have consumed the pork

The six-year-old meat reportedly served to US school pupils

Parents have reacted furiously after their children were reportedly served six-year-old meat at schools in Tennessee.

District Commissioner Michael Herrell told WATE-TV he was contacted by a concerned parent over pork served at a school in Hawkins County.

There are 18 schools in the county with 7,000 students. It is not known how many children were served the meat, although there have been no reports of students being taken ill.

"These high schoolers know when to not eat something, but elementary schoolers - do they know if meat is bad or not?" asked Mr Herrell.

"I'm disappointed the school system let this happen. To me, if we've got meat that old, I don't understand why."

He said he believes old meat could have been served at schools across the county.

Steve Starnes, Hawkins County director of schools, said it plans on implementing new procedures to ensure all frozen food items are in date.

He toldWCYB. the Board of Education discovered meat dating back to 2009, 2010 and 2011 in school freezers.

"We want parents to feel safe in knowing that when they send their children to school here, that we are providing them a quality food service program,” Mr Starnes added.

“We’re going to start incorporating not only the package date but also the delivery date on our inventory items, to make sure we know exactly when those items came in.”

He said each school in the district would also have random inspections quarterly, beginning immediatley.

Guidelines from the US Department of Agriculture state that uncooked meat should be frozen for no longer than 12 months.