March 2020 email newsletter

Customers can get a clear picture through non-verbal clues whether food safety practices are followed once the produce is taken to market or delivered to a CSA drop site.  Today’s consumers are more aware of food safety risks associated with fresh produce than in years past, so it makes sense for growers to use best practices to mitigate risks. We are going to touch on a few ways you can demonstrate and assure customers that food safety is your priority.

The first round of compliance dates for the Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA) Produce Safety Rule – the rules for produce growers that came about as a result of the Food Safety Modernization Act (FSMA) – was at the end of January, 2018, so there’s a lot of attention right now to the Rule and its requirements. This article will address some of the exemptions to the rule, compliance timelines, and training requirements for farmers.

This information is meant to help with understanding some parts of the Produce Safety Rule and related rules. It has not been reviewed, or approved by the FDA.

Pesticide contamination is a growing problem for market farms, regardless of their growing practices. The wrong chemical reaching your farm from an outside source can result in crop damage or loss, concerns about food safety, and damage to your reputation. Contamination can occur through direct spray drift from outside applications, through later volatilization from previous applications, or through use of herbicide-contaminated compost or mulch. Several recent incidents in central Missouri have focused our attention on the various ways that unwanted chemical contamination can surprise and harm market farms. In this article, we share two relevant stories and offer advice for other farmers wanting to prepare for and prevent such incidents on their own land.

Produce-related human illnesses have received substantial media and regulatory attention over the past eight years. Food safety is an important part of growing quality produce, and increased numbers of required third party food safety audits and the impending Food Safety Modernization Act have created the need for improved food safety.

University of Vermont researchers studying food safety in leafy greens expected to find higher levels of E. coli bacteria in summer because foodborne illnesses are higher in summer months, and warmer temperatures are known to induce bacterial growth. But they were surprised by how high the levels were — literally off the chart, which is to say they were higher than the upper limit of detection for the test used.

Wherever water comes into contact with produce, it has the potential to violate the most fundamental of food safety tenets: keep the poop off of the food. Whether it originates from a pond, a stream, or a well, water has the potential to carry and spread the foodborne pathogens that can make people sick.

We already have safe food. Even the large, centralized mega-farms and distribution centers in the desert west produce safe food. In 2006, over 50 billion servings of fresh-cut salad greens and spinach were sold in this country – but an E. coli 0157:H7 outbreak that fall killed five people, and spinach sales still haven’t recovered to a pre-2006 level.
Even at that, the Food Safety Modernization Act is not about keeping people safe.

During periods of short daylight length and low light intensity, there is a potential health risk associated with nitrate accumulation in leafy greens. Nitrates can be converted in the body into toxic nitrites, which reduce the blood’s capacity to carry oxygen. Additionally, nitrites can form carcinogenic nitrosamines.  This topic was investigated by the New Alchemy Institute and others in the 1970’s, faded from the headlines, received some more interest in the late 90’s, then sank again. Health problems are definitely associated with high nitrate intake, and although the evidence that long-term ill-health is caused by high nitrate levels is questioned by some, it is not disputed that reduction of nitrates in the diet is a wise preventative measure. I first learned about the subject from Steve Moore (now teaching AgroEcolgy in the Environmental Studies Department at Elon University, NC) at a weekend course about building and growing in a hoophouse. He gave us a list of steps to take to minimize nitrate levels in winter hoophouse greens. I have added my own research onto that.

The first rule of food safety is to keep the poop off the food. And the first place this matters is right in the field, startingwith the addition of manure-based fertilizers to the soil. Most foodborne pathogens—E. coli 0157:H7, Salmonella and Listeria monocytogenes—are bacteria, and spread through fecal material, whether from animals or humans. But manure and composts are an important tool for building soil and fertilizing crops in a sustainable and sensible manner, and they can be applied in ways that minimize the risks to human health.

Because we grow food on farms, and not in factories, we can’t eliminate the risk of contamination altogether, but understanding the risks can help us evaluate the best ways to reduce the potential contamination of fresh produce on our farms.Domestic and wild animals present less of a food safety risk to foods that are rarely eaten raw, such as potatoes and rutabagas, because cooking kills most microbial pathogens. Crops grown underground are also at much less risk that those grown above ground.

The first principle of microbiological food safety is to keep the poop – and the potentially nasty microbes it carries – off of the food in the first place. That means keeping tools, equipment, and facilities from being contaminated by feces from people and animals right from the start. And because poop inevitably does make it onto our produce and into our packing environment, we need to take reasonable steps to ensure that our tools and equipment don’t spread that poop from one item or one place to another.

On the market farm, almost every crop is harvested and handled by human hands at some point between harvest and sale. People bunch kale, pick up carrots, sort tomatoes, and dump rutabagas into the barrel washer. Even the most automated salad mix washing line still gets cleaned and maintained by people.

With all of the focus on the implementation of the Food Safety Modernization Act, it’s easy to forget that it’s not all about log sheets, audits, and bureaucrats: it’s about keeping the food we grow safe from microbiological and other dangerous contamination.

Two years after the Food Safety Modernization Act was signed into law, the Food and Drug Administration has published its proposed rule for food safety on produce farms. The comment period closes on May 16.

As farmers markets extend their seasons and the demand for local food goes year-round, many growers are creating value-added products to take advantage of the new marketing opportunities. The term “value-added products” encompasses a wide array of farm products, from specialty foods to non-food items such as straw bales and wreaths. In this issue of the JSS Advantage, we’ll focus on creating value-added food products as a way of diversifying your farm’s offerings, extending your selling season, and improving your bottom line.
First, identify potential products. They should be food items that you know and love, because your enthusiasm will be crucial to your marketing success in the future.