September 28, 2006

 

US making progress on food safety

 

 

The US is making progress in its effort to make the country's food supplies safer, but the threat of exotic diseases or pests means officials and producers must stay focused on making even more improvements, US Agriculture Secretary Mike Johanns said Wednesday (Sep 27).

 

"We can no longer take our safety and security for granted, and that includes our food supply," Johanns said in a speech at the International Symposium on Agro-terrorism being held in Kansas City.

 

Diseases and pathogens can travel as easily as food travels from one state or one country to another, Johanns said. The current outbreak of illness from E.Coli O157:H7 on spinach, in which at least three have died, is one example of how much damage can be inflicted by a single event and how easily a pathogen can travel.

 

Johanns emphasised that there is no known threat to the US agriculture industry or food supply at this time, but there are those who want to harm the US, so preparation is needed.

 

To that end, tracing food to its origin is becoming more important than ever, he said. This is why the US has various programmes like export verification, the National Animal Identification System currently being developed, and process verification on organic foods.

 

A presidential directive for government agencies to work together provides the national policy necessary for the USDA, Department of Homeland Security, state and local governments, the Food and Drug Administration and others to put together a plan for food and agriculture safety, Johanns said.

 

The agencies are working to ensure a comprehensive awareness of the threats to US food safety, putting in place trace back systems and monitoring offshore food supplies. The US also is working to help other countries with animal diseases like highly pathogenic H5N1 bird flu in order to reduce the chance of those diseases making it to the US.

 

The agencies also are working on ways to enhance food testing as a means of detecting and containing a disease outbreak or a terrorist intrusion, he said. The cabinet level agencies are working together with law enforcement agencies to develop action plans if an attack should occur.

 

The Strategic Partnership Programme for Agro-terrorism is a cooperative effort to evaluate and assess risks to the industry, Johanns said. These assessments allow more precise planning to prevent a terrorist or natural disease event or to minimise its effects should it get started anyway.

 

Paramount in the testing and research portion of enhancing US food safety is the planned construction of the National Agricultural Biologics Security Centre, he said. The site for this facility has yet to be decided, but it is intended to conduct research into a variety of pathogens and pests and find ways to stop or to deal with them.

 

After his speech, Johanns met with reporters and stressed that the US food supply is getting safer. Using 1996 to 1998 as a baseline, the number of Listeria cases in the US during 2005 was down 32 percent. E.Coli O157:H7 was down 29 percent. Shigella was down 43 percent, and cases of Salmonella was down 9 percent.

 

"Everything we're doing is working," he said.