Economic Analysis of Food Safety Compliance Costs and Foodborne Illness Outbreaks in the United States

Ribera, Luis A.; Palma, Marco A.; Paggi, Mechel S.; Knutson, Ronald D.; Masabni, Joseph; Anciso, Juan

doi:10.21273/horttech.22.2.150

Cited by 33 publications

(21 citation statements)

References 9 publications

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“…Outbreaks are not only a risk to public health, but also frequently damage consumer confidence in the safety of the fresh produce supply chain, leading to substantial economic losses to produce growers and associated industries (19).…”

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confidence: 99%

Salmonella Newport and Typhimurium Colonization of Fruit Differs from Leaves in Various Tomato Cultivars

Han¹,

Micallef²

2014

Journal of Food Protection

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Several outbreaks of Salmonella enterica infections have been linked to tomatoes. One cost-effective way to complement on-farm preventive Good Agricultural Practices is to identify cultivars with inherent decreased susceptibility to Salmonella colonization. Fruit and leaves of 13 tomato cultivars with distinct phenotypes were screened to evaluate their susceptibility to Salmonella epiphytic colonization. Field-grown fruit or gnotobiotically grown seedling leaves were spot inoculated in replicate with either Salmonella Typhimurium LT2 or a tomato outbreak-associated strain of Salmonella Newport. Initial loads of the Salmonella inocula were 2.5 log CFU per fruit and 3.5 or 7.0 log CFU per seedling. Salmonella cells were retrieved and enumerated using direct plating after 24 h of incubation at room temperature for fruit and 72 h at 26°C during the day and 18°C at night for seedling leaves. Epiphytic colonization of fruit by S. enterica was cultivar-dependent and serotype-specific, but did not necessarily correlate with leaf colonization. Fruit of cultivar Heinz-1706 were the least colonized by Salmonella Newport, while the highest populations were retrieved from fruit of Nyagous. By contrast, seedling leaves supporting the lowest populations were Florida 91 VF and the highest were Virginia Sweets for Salmonella Newport. For Salmonella Typhimurium the lowest was Nyagous and the highest was Heinz-1706 and Moneymaker. The tomato outbreak strain of Salmonella Newport attained higher population densities on fruit than did Salmonella Typhimurium, suggesting better adaptation to tomato fruit colonization. Salmonella Newport populations were significantly lower on leaves, but not fruit of the near-isogenic line Movione, compared with the parent cultivar Moneymaker, suggesting the immunity conferring gene Pto could be responding to this outbreak strain. Susceptibility of tomato fruit to Salmonella colonization is highly variable and could be one criterion for cultivar selection for cultivation.

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confidence: 99%

Salmonella Newport and Typhimurium Colonization of Fruit Differs from Leaves in Various Tomato Cultivars

Han¹,

Micallef²

2014

Journal of Food Protection

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“…The biggest buyers influence the entire producebuying sector (Fister Gale 2006;Havinga 2006;Ribera et al 2012). Other buyers may decide, in order to remain competitive and entice customers, to adopt similar or even more stringent food safety policies.…”

Section: Recent Impacts On Growersmentioning

confidence: 99%

Hasty responses to foodborne illness outbreaks impact California growers

Latack¹,

Ozeran²

2020

Calif Agr

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I n the last 3 years the United States has seen four major foodborne illness outbreaks related to leafy greens, which resulted in 399 cases of foodborne illness. Altogether, 180 people were hospitalized and six people died. These outbreaks were well beyond the severity of foodborne illness we had typically seen prior to 2017. Romaine lettuce, the identified source of all four outbreaks, was recalled, thousands of consumers were told to throw out what they had in their refrigerator and a nationwide questioning of U.S. food safety has ensued. The U.S. food system is extremely complex and livestock operations, produce growers and retail produce buyers have made significant efforts to address and mitigate food safety risks in this complex system. However, there are hundreds of possible contamination points during production and preparation before food reaches the consumer. The contamination point of fresh produce is particularly difficult to trace, since each produce handler is aware only of the previous handler and not the entire system. The agency involved in the traceback process, often the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) or Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), depending on the size and severity of the outbreak, must trace from consumer to grocery store to distributor to shipper to processor to the multiple farms the processor procures produce from. Identifying the point of contamination is therefore very difficult, and sometimes impossible. For example, investigators of the 2017 leafy green Escherichia coli (E. coli) O157:H7 outbreak were never able to identify the source of the contaminated produce. Even if the investigating agency can trace the pathogen source to a contamination site, the process may take several months. Soil, water, vegetation, rodents, OUTLOOK Hasty responses to foodborne illness outbreaks impact California growers Four major foodborne illness outbreaks in 3 years have led to stricter requirements for leafy greens growers that may satisfy corporate buyers and reassure the public, but also highlight a serious need for more food safety research.

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“…Hardesty and Kusunose (2009) found that California leafy greens growers did not receive a price premium for implementing the compliance requirements of the Leafy Greens Marketing Agreement (LGMA), but LGMA does differ from other food safety programs as it has nearly 100% grower adoption. And although Ribera, Palma, Paggi, Knutson, and Masabn (2012) found that the compliance costs incurred by growers to demonstrate food safety assurance are much lower than the costs incurred during a produce-associated outbreak (i.e. declining sales and unsaleable product), it is unlikely that the growers with GAP certification are buffered from the volatile market during an outbreak.…”

Section: Tablementioning

confidence: 99%

Effect of market channel, farm scale, and years in production on mid-Atlantic vegetable producers' knowledge and implementation of Good Agricultural Practices

et al. 2016

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a b s t r a c tFoodborne illnesses associated with fresh produce have dramatically increased within the last decade. Good Agricultural Practices (GAP) were developed to address potential sources of pre-harvest microbial contamination, but certification remains low. The majority of mid-Atlantic vegetable farms are fresh market, but limited information is available about what on-farm production practices are being utilized to mitigate food safety risks. Our goal was to assess Maryland and Delaware vegetable producers' understanding and implementation of GAP. An electronic survey on pre-harvest production practices was administered at commercial grower meetings in 2010 and 2013. A total of 313 surveys were analyzed, and Probit regression was used to estimate the average marginal effects of farm scale, years in production and market channel on the probability of using different on-farm food safety practices. Generally, food safety practices did not differ across farm scale or years in production. However, market channel did influence a grower's decision to implement some food safety practices. Growers who marketed their produce primarily through wholesale channels were more likely to: have written policies for how they grew and handled their produce, test their irrigation water at least once a year for microbial contamination, or be GAP-certified. Economic constraints were not reported as the primary obstacle for GAP implementation in either survey. While more research is needed to better understand how market channel influences decision-making activities including on-farm food safety practices, this study highlights the complexity of the issue and the need for GAP educational programs to expand beyond a onesize-fits-all approach.

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Economic Analysis of Food Safety Compliance Costs and Foodborne Illness Outbreaks in the United States

Cited by 33 publications

References 9 publications

Salmonella Newport and Typhimurium Colonization of Fruit Differs from Leaves in Various Tomato Cultivars

Salmonella Newport and Typhimurium Colonization of Fruit Differs from Leaves in Various Tomato Cultivars

Hasty responses to foodborne illness outbreaks impact California growers

Effect of market channel, farm scale, and years in production on mid-Atlantic vegetable producers' knowledge and implementation of Good Agricultural Practices

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