Who's Really Responsible for Food Safety? | Inside Food Safety EP.6

0:00When we talk about food safety, there's an assumption most of us make. If food is being sold in the United States, someone has to make sure it's safe. But what does that actually mean? Over the last several weeks, we've watched a massive cyclospore investigation involving iceberg lettuce source from Mexico expand across the country. Now we're dealing with another major produce issue. Salmanella linked to jalapenos originating from Mexico with recalls expanding into products made with those peppers. Two different pathogens, two different products, but they raise a much bigger question. A head of lettuce grown in the United States with the jalapeno grown outside the United States are legally expected to meet US food safety standards. But are they produced, inspected and verified in the same way? And when an ingredient crosses a border, passes through a distributor, enters a processing facility and ends up inside salsa guacamole or a finished restaurant product, who is actually responsible for making sure it's safe. Today on Inside Food Safety,

1:02Eric Moore and Kylie Harper Larson are back with us to help separate the regulation from reality. We're looking at the latest cyclospora and Salmanella outbreaks, how recalls expand through the supply chain, what domestic producers are required to do versus foreign suppliers and importers, and ultimately whether our food safety system is preventing contamination or discovering it after people get sick. Eric, my man, where are you today, you're in Philly? I was actually planning to go to Washington DC tonight for FDA's holding a public meeting around Listeria and but I had some personal things that are keeping me away from attending that, so I'll be depending it virtually. Well, I think a lot has happened, and since we had our last episode touching on cyclospora and whatnot, Kylie. First of all, thanks for, you know, so we're doing this rendezvous thing here. We're in Lakeland again at Lake Mirror. We're sitting in the truck,

2:08and our view is literally Lake Mirror here in Lakeland, and this is actually quite nice. It is. It is. I did mention to you earlier that I really feel like we should do this in the middle of the lake in a swan boat that he vetoed that, Eric. Yes, it was an absolute veto. Since our last episode, what's changed with the cyclospora outbreak? Well, we've got more folks identified by the CDC and their respective state health departments as having cyclospora. In the same tone, we also do not have a congressional action calling anyone to come to DC and answer for what is happening. And we still see the recall and the outbreak. It was expanding. And there is some serious back and forth between the state departments of health and the CDC about actual numbers. So what does that actually mean? Means there's a lot

3:11of questions, and they know what they know, but there's more that they don't know. Or they're not revealing. Is that possible? You know, I'm a little bit of a conspiracy theorist, and I would, I would say so. But I know that they hold back until they are positive. No pun intended on the food safety end about what they do know when they don't know a lot, they tend not to point the fingers, especially when it has a major political donor involved. Yeah, I mean, you know what the, I think the importance of boots on the ground, epidemiological investigation, it has just continued to illustrate, you know, the importance of those individuals within the regulatory structure. But it also highlights, I think, the complexity in what they do aligned with what else is going on,

4:22right? Like because what they do takes time, all the lab test and takes time, people getting sick, like it's just all these all these stings that none of it is like, is super fast. And unfortunately, we're just sort of caught in this perfect storm, almost of what's been going on. And not to mention incubation time of cyclospora, right? Which is a lot longer. They have re incubation. Yes. Unfortunately, for those that have got sick, they can easily get sick again. Right. But how does an investigator link an outbreak to a product when the original positive sample was later ruled a false pilot? Oh, such a heavy topic right there. Well, they have to keep sampling. And it doesn't negate that original sample. So my sincere hope is that original sample is being preserved so it can go for further testing.

5:28But it has to be preserved in a freezer. Yeah. In the lab testing, whether it's this, this incident, right? This outbreak or it's another one. You know, that's just one factor, right? Of the like the whole investigative procedure. And as I'm sure a lot of people have heard in the news, right? Cyclospora is really hard to test for. It just, you know, it is. It can be on one leaf of lettuce. And maybe it's not on another one from this from the same head. But you know, it's you know, the combination of epidemiological work, the ability of the investigators to adequately trace products back to their source is another like key aspect. And then layered in top of that, it is is some sort of laboratory analysis. And a lot of times you'll get two of those three,

6:31two of those three like pillars. And that is the way that the investigation team will end up moving forward and saying, you know, there is a problem. There isn't. And you know, I think that's where we're at like there. They were able to get adequate epidemiological information. And they were able to piece together some traceability information. So even with the lack of the the lab feedback or the challenge with obtaining the lab level information, they're still able to move forward on on on saying, you know, with a high probability that this product from this place caused these issues. And I think that that's really good as a consumer as well. Because it does lend

7:33itself to asking the question, well, if I can't get it from this company, where can I get it from? And what is safe and what should I for a while maybe stay away from because there is so much that I don't know. Well, let's wander this down a little bit, right? Because not everybody out there are not everyone is a couple of food safety pros like you two, right? And if we're talking about like jalapenos and we're talking about salmonella, if it's if it's a if salmonella is in one ingredient like a jalapeno. And you're talking about recalls of salsa and guacamole and other, you know, finished products. What is the average person supposed to do at this point? Just stay away from their local Mexican restaurants, stay away from, you know, the produce section at the grocery store. Like what's the what do people do? Well, I think what we're talking about with jalapenos is a little

8:34bit different than what we're talking about with cyclospora and the but most people don't understand the differences between one or the other and what else is out there. Yes. The in the common person doesn't, but what we have is a key difference between these two even though Taylor Farms is in both Taylor Farms grew and processed the lettuce and they are named from a traceback exercise. In the instance with the salmonella in the jalapenos, there are a product of Mexico according to the importer, coast of citrus in San Diego. They are not naming a farm yet. Taylor Farms bought that product from coast as an importer. They didn't grow it. And right now we're still saying

9:41who grew it, who harvested it, who packed it, and where did it go before it came into coast citrus and then Taylor Farms processing plants to go into those 20 odd products. Have they determined whether or not it came from the Taylor Farms distribution side or is this actually from the original farm? They do not know yet. When a recall expands, are we finding more contamination or discovering where the original product went? Because I don't know that people exactly understand these processes and this whole thing is very skewed. For me, I'm in the middle of this. I know a lot of folks like you guys, I know a lot of folks like just the average everyday Joe, Jane consumer. We're all different here. I have a little bit more information by the people I keep company with, but I'm lucky. Most people aren't. Yeah, I would say, right, like typically,

10:45right, as a recall expands in using the South group, the jalapenos, it illustrates the complexity of the food system that we are in today, right? Whoever grew those, then they get shipped and distributed somewhere, they're then getting processed and put into other products. And for those that may recall in the mid 2000s, early 2000s, like 2011, I love it, maybe 2009, the spinach recall, or even going back further to the peanut corporation of America, the peanut paste recall that it was massive. There were 3000 products involved in that recall. And what we're seeing with this jalapeno recall, as it expands, is that this trace back or trace forward process, they're able to

11:49better or in the process of identifying where all these jalapenos ended up going. And the better they can do that, the faster they can do that, the better they can get product off off the market. That's, it takes, unfortunately, it just takes time. The way that the system is designed right now, right? It just takes a little bit of time to really begin to put a, a finger on exactly where all these things went. Because maybe they lead the coast, the coast facility, they go to a nice scenario, a larger distribution center. And maybe there's some aspect of a production going on in that distribution center where they're subpacking these things. It just, it gets really, really complicated to trace these things down.

12:54I will concur with you on that and to shed a little bit of light as to when a recall initially begins, it always expands. Most of the time, we don't see contraction in that because of the news of the recall spreading and people saying, hmm, when I got sick a day or two ago, was that this or was that that it leads into a little bit of personal investigation. In the instance of the psychospora and then the salmonella, with psychospora not having a quick testing method and salmonella being quicker, we're seeing more information come out about salmonella simply because testing can occur so much more readily. One of the biggest things that comes up to

14:00echo what you said, Eric, is the complexities that occur in our food system, but as we get further up into what we call value added or processed goods, the numbers though decrease dramatically. The supply chain for those products decreases dramatically because not everyone can afford to have a processing plant or a processing facility that has a number of lines within that. So most of the time when we have a very large recall in both instances here and we have products that can be provided both whole and process, you will find that those recalls will continue for a significant amount of time. We don't know with the jalapenos and the salmonella right now because coast

15:04has never put a press release out themselves. They just said, we're going to voluntarily recall this and oh, by the way, Taylor Farms is linked to it, go chase them down more because they already have a target on their back. They literally have not owned up to anything as an importer and they're under a little bit of a different legal situation because they are what's called an importer of record underneath the Food Safety Modernization Act Foreign Supplier Verification Program, whereas Taylor Farms de Mexico imported its own product and therefore they were able to do the trace back albeit in a cumbersome way much quicker. So the complexities of the supply chain when dealing with importers is much like Dante's in Ferno, the various levels of hell exist.

16:04Well, let's talk domestic versus imported, right? Because you're talking about, we are talking about imported products a lot here, not just stuff grown here in the country. What sort of food safety requirements applied to the US grown produce versus a product grown abroad for the US market? Well, as a produce safety trainer and as a preventive control trainer, I can answer that question very easily. The same legal expectations for product grown in the United States and marketed to US consumers as well as foreign product grown outside the United States and brought into the United States are legally supposed to meet the same exact conditions, farming, harvesting, packing

17:05and processing. But we're talking about the law here and it's kind of like seeing a posted speed limit. When it's 45 or we always do in 45, I mean, it's the law. So some of us go under, some of us stay at 45 and some of us don't care. And unfortunately, sometimes biology shows up even when practices are in place. Well, biology seems to be shown up a lot. I literally just got a notification that 10 million pounds of meat and poultry are recalled for the stereo. I mean, literally, as we're recording, that just popped up on the feed. So Eric will be attending that webinar and I've already signed up for it. Good. Yes. Well, you know, I would just, I would just like,

18:09you know, kind of add right to what Kylie was saying, right? Like the expectations are the same, right? And maybe the differentiator is that domestic, domestic growers, shippers, etc. They're subject to FD's domestic regulatory framework, right? So the oversight is maybe a little a little bit greater, whereas foreign suppliers, right? They, there is, they, there aren't enough employees, regulatory employees to go out and inspect every, you know, every agricultural field on the planet. You know, so there is a much higher resilience of the putting expectations, standards and requirements out there and tracking the good organizations and identifying the

19:13poor performing organizations so that, you know, the FDA can have better visibility of things coming in and they can begin to try to, you know, create some boundaries, if you will, or some obstacles for getting things actually into the country for some of those like bad players. You know, but again, it's, you know, we have a lot of borders and we have a lot of points of importation, especially for food on both sides of, of the United States. And, you know, there's a lot of stuff that's coming in and not a lot of eyes that get to see it all. So, you know, what you're saying as well too, Eric, I mean, to just put numbers in play there. We're talking about a total domestic and foreign, 440 physical people

20:15to conduct these investigations that are qualified by the FDA without the support of the departments of agriculture and the departments health in each of the states, which they may or may not have memorandums of understanding with and even when they do those personnel on the state level may not be qualified in the areas. So, when we're talking about a lot of produce inspections, there are certain states that simply do not have the staff that are adequately qualified to help perform investigations along with the FDA. They've been highly dependent for the entirety of the Food Safety Modernization Act and its investigation requirements following the 2011 Listeria Monositogony outbreak that happened in canelopes on the state departments of agriculture and the state departments of health to help them in performing many of the local

21:19investigative duties. And it just simply is impossible to get out there. So, then what is the US importer required to verify when you're talking about foreign suppliers? Well, they are required to do one of two things, if not both. They are required to obtain a GFSI, that means global food safety initiative, benchmarked audit for that product from its previous step. Notice I said previous step. It doesn't mean that they have to take it all the way down to the farm level because it's one step forward and one step back. If they can't get that audit and have it reviewed by a qualified individual, then they themselves have to perform through a qualified

22:22individual a FISMA accepted audit. So, we're talking about nearly 100% of the time. They obtain what is called a third party audit that has been conducted on site by their previous one step back. And if that one step back was the packing house and not the farmer and it was where aggregation of five types of iceberg lettuce and 10 types of jalapenos coming from a hundred different farms occurred. All they have is that facility audit. So, then we have to play a lot of what I call Inspector Gadget in getting to the bottom of it and finding out who grew it, who harvested it, who packed it initially, who repacked it, which is I think you touched on that a little bit earlier, Eric, never,

23:25ever, ever in my 20 years in the produce industry seen foreign product that made it here to the United States that did not get repacked at some point in the process. And that builds up a whole lot of traceability problems within batches and lots and codes and you see recalls and outbreaks expand and more people get named when repacking occurs. Well, think of it from the restaurants perspective. I mean, how much can a chef for an operator realistically know where their produce is coming from? And are they required to ask for more? Like there's a lot of responsibility that goes around traceability has to go through the whole supply chain. So a chef is required since he is going to or she is going to serve the public. She is simply required to have a supplier list.

24:30And make sure that those suppliers are following the food safety modernization at. Now with the information that has been presented and as our experience grows, one would say it would be who you to attempt to get as much information about what you're serving. And this is not just for produce. This is for all ingredients that are being served. As you just stated, 10 million pounds of meat and I'm sure Eric is going that's going to get a lot bigger. Because if they're starting with 10 million pounds, it's going to be one of the bigger players. It's going to get bigger. Remember what I said about processing folks. It gets tighter at the top. So that's where it expands. I would just say this is where relationships with your suppliers,

25:32your vendors really play an important role. And really understanding their business model to some degree and how they vet the people they're getting their products from is really is really important. Because the likelihood of a chef knowing, having a clear line of sight of where all of their products are coming from all the way back to the farm, I think realistically that is a really challenging, almost impossible thing to actually be able to incorporate into most businesses today. But the better that you understand the organization you're buying your products through,

26:36and that's where it gets thrown around like approved supplier lists and vendors and things like that. Really understanding how that organization operates, how it works, how do they evaluate where they're picking, where they're buying their produce from, and things like that is really in your best interest to have a clear understanding of what that is. And you know, is then that's should be able to provide you with a level of, of, of, to some degree, trust on when things do begin to happen like this situation where now whether it's lettuce, peppers, you know, or, or imported meat or, or, or what have you, then you know that, you know, they're going to be reaching out to you proactively to say, hey, listen, you know, we're, we're, we're, whether it's switching a provider

27:39because of, you know, this problem or concern or more products aren't involved in this. And, you know, they are not involved in this recall, they are not. And here is how we know that, you know, from the best of their ability to provide that information. I think it's really important for people to understand the value and in having a good relationship with their, with their suppliers. I can't agree with you more. Me coming from distribution 25 years and produce, it matters where you're buying the product. And the level of competency of that distributor, how deep they are with their own hasop plans and their food to food safety plans. You know, sometimes chefs and people in the industry want to buy from the least expensive option. And a lot of times that option means there's, you know, the smaller

28:39the operation, the smaller the produce company, the distributor is, the more they can, you know, buy smaller loads, polish every apple, so to speak. And you think you're getting this great deal, you know, the price is fair. But the reality is the, all of these checks and balances, a lot of times go out the window because you don't really know where they're picking that product up from. And the traceability goes right out the window. So, when we're talking about, where the biggest vulnerabilities are, is it the farm, is it the water, the processing, is it verifications, imports, traceability? I mean, where does it, where do you draw the, where does it stop? I think the largest vulnerability that we have as a nation is our dependence on foreign product to fill the gaps when distributors and retailers, unfortunately,

29:49deem domestic product too expensive. Throughout the United States, generally speaking, there's a fair amount of production ability that farmers have. And we've got better oversight. We've got more inspections going on. We've got more demand for audits in every single field and testing to occur that we're, we have this compounded demand that I want avocados, which by the way, on fact, are on import detention again, out of Mexico, because Lafamilia doesn't like it when they can't send a little cocaine with their, their avocados and they like the threatened USDA inspectors. So, but great news, Florida

30:49Avocado season is starting. I mean, who doesn't like some cocaine with your avocado on toast? You know, sometimes, sometimes they throw out a little bit of marijuana in there, you know, to keep things wrapped up. Fun fact, they painted one recently like a watermelon and it made its way through. Kylie, everything you're saying makes a lot of sense. All right, so if you guys can, if you guys can actually change some stuff about how produce is grown or verified, inspected, et cetera, in order to prevent the next outbreak, what would they be? All right, let me lead off. And I'll actually take one quick second to, you know, to address that vulnerability piece. And I just want to say, you know, the biggest vulnerability, right, is the fact that it's a systems problem, right? Or are everything in the system,

31:52whether it's farming practices, it's irrigation water management, it's verification, you know, importer accountability, and being able to identify products anywhere in the supply chain. All those things have to work, right? So it's a very, very complex system. And, you know, until we have a better solution for that, like the system is the actual vulnerable, it vulnerability in my, in my opinion. Now, you know, changing, changing some things, or, you know, what is a better tomorrow look like? I guess it may be to reframe that. You know, I think traceability, like, is an important thing that actually needs to come to fruition. You know, there are other industries that are able to trace things very rapidly, you know,

32:52in a matter of seconds, you know, from point of point of question to point of origin. I really, I understand the complexity in the food, in the food systems. I just think with, with today's, you know, technology and the, the importance of, of getting things out of the system faster from the prevention perspective, I think traceability is a huge, huge thing that will, that will enhance that. But, and I also don't want to downplay the complexity, because I realized that it is a very, very complex topic, especially for very, very large organizations. It is not something that they can just turn a light switch on and off, and it happens. It's, it's, it's more complicated than that. I think that the another thing is, you know, in a perfect world, you know, with all the imports coming into the United States,

33:53if there was a way to, to really beef up the, the foreign supplier verification system, whether that's through better technology based tools, or it's through better people based, people based tools, either those two things, or a combination there of both of them. I think that is, that would be a really, a really great step towards, towards improvement as well. And, you know, prevention is, is, is obviously, you know, the ideal is we want to, you know, that would be like the third thing. How can we, we'll create better preventative controls to alleviate these things from ever even getting into the system? And, you know, I think that is, that is, hopefully, what the future will, will actually begin to, to show us answers to, you know, around how can we actually, you know, begin to, to, to create better

34:59sanitation controls, better equipment design, cleaning water better, and more efficiently, and effectively. You know, I think all of those things will, you know, can, can provide a better preventative framework to, to, to really begin to eliminate products before they every, ever even enter into the supply chain system. I wholeheartedly agree. I will say, we dream the impossible dream, or at least aspirational, at this moment. We have to realize that the food safety traceability portion of the Food Safety Modernization Act has been a factor of the original law that was passed in 2011. And it has been held up, and held up, and held up, by effect of lobbying efforts, albeit some of them, I have actually participated in because the framework was there,

36:03but the details to enact it were not. Now, we have the details. Now, we just, unfortunately, have lobbying groups for the wrong reasons, holding it up. And we may see the conflagration of these recalls and outbreaks with cyclospora, samanella, and now, mysterious. I mean, we all need is a good E. colo 157, sugar toxin producing there to, you know, round out the rainbow of horridness that is happening. When we talk about traceability, this isn't just a foreign problem, it's a domestic problem too, okay? And we have to, we have to face the facts within that. But if we help solve the complexity issue, that's why I said, you the chef, you the consumer, ask the question,

37:07where is this coming from? Not where did the box get packed? But where did the product get reduced? Man, I'll tell you what, you know, if it's me, this is a great time to go on a diet. Just, you know, stop eating all together or eat all of these compromised products and use it that way. Yeah, exactly. I listen, I think this has been another great episode, you know, bringing the, what's happening now in news on food safety to the, to the table, so to speak, real quick. Eric, how do we find you? Uh, LinkedIn, Eric Moore, zero zero one, you do find, uh, Teso at, uh, capital, North America dot com as well. Perfect. Kylie, baby, what about you? You find me on LinkedIn, Kylie Harper Larson, I think I'm probably the only one. You can also reach me on agsafetylady.com or as everybody who's in the know, just beat the drum.

38:09All right, hey, listen again, appreciate y'all. We're gonna do this again, I think at like mirror. It's pretty cozy over here. Um, until the next time, watch your hands, folks. We are out.