US food safety and consumer watchdogs have made calls to the Food and Drug Administration to implement emergency regulations requiring traceability for food products following last month’s outbreak of salmonella from tainted tomatoes that hit nearly 20 states.
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In a statement, the Center for Science in the Public Interest and the Consumer Federation of America said that if fruits and vegetables can be tracked back up through the supply chain back to the farm, investigators would have an easier time nailing down the source of outbreaks of Salmonella, E. coli, and other dangerous pathogens.
“Effective traceability labelling must encompass the multiple steps along the path from farm to table, including farm-of-origin, packer, distributor, and retailer,” the groups wrote in a letter to Andrew von Eschenbach, commissioner of the Food and Drug Administration. “Such a system should use a standardised code for all FDA-regulated items to streamline investigations and ensure effective record-keeping by all entities along the production chain.”
The letter said that major players in the produce business already know how to use the basic technology needed for traceability: little stickers on fruits and vegetables. The industry already has standard price look-up codes, or PLUs, that retailers can use at the register. But similar, standardised codes could let retailers, food safety investigators, or even consumers know exactly what farm the produce hails from.
In June, a salmonella outbreak saw well over 150 reported cases, including at least 23 hospitalisations, in 17 states of people falling ill from eating tainted tomatoes. That incident, in turn, brought to mind similar recent nationwide recalls over spinach and peanut butter.
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By GlobalDataThose incidents, as well as the beef E. coli scandal last autumn that led to over 20 million lbs of beef being recalled, and safety scares around food imported into the US, have prompted national discussion over the safety of food and the effectiveness of the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA).
“Each outbreak causes huge losses, both for the consumers who become severely ill and for the growers, who often can’t sell their products,” said CSPI food safety director Caroline Smith DeWaal. “Unfortunately, as this investigation has dragged on, the produce industry is reaping what it sowed when it sought and received special exemptions that allowed the industry to avoid the country of origin labeling requirements Congress passed in 2002. While new requirements are scheduled to go into effect later this year, FDA needs to go beyond country of origin labeling and give public health officials the ability to trace produce from the fork back to the farm.”
Although the FDA and the Centers for Disease Control are casting a wider net to locate the food source responsible for the current Salmonella outbreak, CSPI says the public should still follow the FDA’s current advice which tomatoes to eat and which to avoid.
“If FDA had put a traceability system in place two years ago following the spinach outbreak, this current investigation might be moving more quickly,” said Chris Waldrop, director of the Food Policy Institute at Consumer Federation of America. “This latest outbreak demonstrates very clearly the need for the federal government to quickly and easily trace an implicated food to its source.”
The letter from CFA and CSPI also urges the agency to require growers and packers to implement written food safety plans, similar to the hazard control plans that have proved successful in reducing bacterial contamination of fresh meat and poultry. CSPI has been encouraging the FDA to require such plans since 2006.
