April 2, 2012

Weekly working phone calls, new website part of cantaloupe safety guidance development process

The industry collaborative working on updating food safety guidance specific to cantaloupe will begin holding weekly conference calls starting Tuesday, April 10, at noon ET, 9 a.m. PT.

They’ve also launched a new website where the public can view documents and progress.

During a webinar today, leaders of the initiative announced their plan to hold approximately 15 weekly phone sessions during which time stakeholders from throughout the industry will be asked to call in and discuss specific topics as they relate to various parts of a complete guidance document. Areas of discussion are likely to include irrigation, wash water, hygiene, materials, sanitation, equipment, handling, pest control, transportation, recall procedures, documentation and records, among others.

“The industry has developed a number of guidances over the past few years,” said David Gombas, United Fresh senior vice president for food safety and technology. “Our initiative here is to come up with a guidance document that is most appropriate for the cantaloupe industry.

“What we’re talking about is a document that is going to be voluntary, science-based and specific.”

It will also have to be flexible so that it can be applied to growing and handling processes not just in the U.S., but around the world, Gombas said. The intent is to provide operators at every step in the supply chain guidance to use in tailoring their own food safety programs.

Industry, academic and government experts met in San Diego at the beginning of the year to kick off a process to improve cantaloupe safety in the wake of last fall’s deadly listeria outbreaks associated with cantaloupe grown on a Colorado farm. They decided to form three task forces: one relating to research, another on training and the third to address safety guidance.

Originally, the guidance committee was going to hold several meetings for industry stakeholders only, in different parts of the U.S. However, they went to the webinar/phone format to make the process more accessible.

A facilitation team composed of Gombas, PMA Chief Science and Technology Officer Bob Whitaker, Western Growers Senior Vice President for Strategic Planning, Science and Technology Hank Giclas and Allison Moore, communications director, Fresh Produce Association of the Americas, will help shepherd the process “in a way that essentially results in a product at the end of the day that can be used by the entire industry,” Giclas said.

“As we go through the process, all of us as the facilitation group will reach out to subject matter experts, getting expert opinions, data,” said Moore.

The schedule will be updated weekly on the website, where new information and developments will also be provided as the process unfolds.

“We’re doing this to make this as accessible as we possibly can to the industry,” Giclas said. “We also need to make it as transparent as we can, not only for the industry, but there are a lot of people who are interested in this topic and would like to track, if you will, the progress that is made by the industry.”

The group hopes to have a draft document completed by Aug. 1.

To visit the new website, click here.

 





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