ARLINGTON, Va. – The Food Protection Committee (FPC) of the Food Marketing Institute (FMI) released its initiatives for 2019 following a meeting in Miami, Florida held in January. The initiatives include:
- Leafy greens outbreak response;
- Retail food safety leadership development;
- Supply chain food safety programs, and
- Non-O157:H7 STEC in ground beef.
“Food retailers and the FMI Food and Product Safety team are prepared to take a greater leadership role to protect the public from foodborne illness,” FMI said. “These four initiatives represent the challenges facing the food retail and wholesale industries and where FMI and our collective members can make a difference.”
Initiatives aimed at leafy green outbreak response include visiting farms in Yuma, Arizona to meet with produce safety experts. Retail food safety leadership activities will include organizing opportunities for FMI members to receive additional resources and training to improve “technical and soft-skill food safety knowledge competencies…”
FMI staff intend to provide guidance to FMI members to ensure food remains safe regardless of where it stored or the method of transport. And the organization plans to work with members to address the emerging issue of non-O157:H7 E. coli species being linked to foodborne outbreaks.
Details of FMI’s food safety initiatives can be found here.
