Frank Yiannas, the vice president of food safety and health for Wal-Mart, told some 300 industry members at the annual meeting of the U.S. Apple Association in Chicago that illnesses caused by foodborne pathogens are becoming much easier to track and investigate, so "what you did for food safety last year is no longer good enough, and you’re going to have to do something different this year and next year,” according to an article at Good Fruit Grower.
Today’s supermarkets have tens of thousands of food products, and there will be new products derived from apples that will introduce new risks over the next 20 years, he said. “This concept of history of safe use, don’t let that lull you into complacency,” he said.
Yiannas offered several tips to help ensure growers and packers are doing all they can to prevent an outbreak: avoid complacency; ask questions and question assumptions; manage real, regulatory and perceived risk. “If you aren’t an expert on true, public health risk, get experts,” he said.
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