COLORADO SPRINGS — Scientific advances in food safety won't fully pay off unless the food industry strengthens its “food safety culture,” Frank Yiannas, vice president, food safety, Wal-Mart Stores, said in a presentation here last week.
“Culture is just as important as the science,” he said at a session during the Grocery Manufacturers Association Executive Conference. “The soft stuff is the real hard stuff where you can make a difference as food firms.”
He said best practices include setting high expectations, educating and training, communicating throughout an organization, establishing goals and measurement systems, and reinforcing positive and negative consequences.
“We [industry leaders] own the food safety culture,” he told an audience of top executives of supplier and retail companies. “If your organization has a less than acceptable culture, it's because you're OK with that.”
He said Wal-Mart is a big supporter of Global Food Safety Initiative benchmark standards, “and we encourage you to join us in adopting these.”
“My job [at Wal-Mart] is not to create a bigger food safety program, but to strengthen the culture of food safety in that organization,” he said. “And that's certainly your role as leaders and food manufacturers.”
Christopher Lischewski, president and chief executive officer, Bumble Bee Foods, said brands must take full responsibility for assuring product safety.
“Food safety is our No. 1 commitment,” he said. We have that ingrained in our culture.”
Michael Doyle, Regents professor and director, University of Georgia Center for Food Safety, cited both good and bad news on the food safety front.
On the positive side, “the CDC [Centers for Disease Control] and state public health departments are identifying many outbreaks that wouldn't have been recognized five years ago,” he said.
However, he added, imported foods have brought new challenges to the food safety battle. “There are gaps in the food safety net for imported foods. China's food safety is threatened by illicit practices.”
Mitchell Cohen, director, Coordinating Center for Infectious Diseases, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, outlined how the nature of food safety has changed over the past century.
The main challenges have switched from culprits such as botulism at the beginning of the 20th century, to E. coli O157:H7 and listeriosis today.
“There are increases in susceptible populations today because people are older,” he said. “There are new microbes and increasing antibiotic resistance.”
Cohen said there are about 76 million cases of foodborne disease a year in the United States.
