SALINAS, CA - What’s your produce safety call to action? Center for Produce Safety asked that question of our Research Symposium attendees in June.

Looking ahead to 2024, helping the industry prioritize produce safety will be CPS’ call. We are constantly looking for new ways to get CPS research into the industry’s hands, to improve industry practices—and ultimately, to raise the bar on produce safety.

CPS already offers a wide spectrum of tools to help our supply chain mitigate produce safety risks. Sometimes, CPS research contributes to our fundamental understanding—for example, about a pathogen’s biology or how it gets transmitted. Sometimes CPS research seeks proof of concept; I’m watching Cornell University’s Abby Snyder, Ph.D., evaluation of condensation-free superheated steam to sanitize equipment in dry packing environments.

Sometimes CPS research appears to be commodity-specific, but learnings apply broadly, as I noted from the University of Georgia’s Jinru Chen, Ph.D.’s new study of blueberry harvest-sanitation practices.

Frequently, CPS research leads to better tools, better guidelines, and new best practices. For example, because of Texas A&M’s Vijay Joshi, Ph.D.’s, research into onion growing practices, Taylor Farms looked again at how we farm Romaine in the fall when outbreaks have historically occurred. While we didn’t find anything obvious, our farming team began a valuable conversation.

In 2024, CPS wants to make our wealth of resources more useful to you.

We are planning a major overhaul of www.CenterforProduceSafety.org, so our research is easier to search, and the takeaways are more clear.

And our 2024 Research Symposium in June is shaping up to be an invaluable learning experience. Join us to not only learn the latest science from and interact with our researchers but also to network with diverse stakeholders. For free annual summaries, see CPS’s website.

Our industry puts fresh foods on tables for our families, our employees, and our consumers—so our business couldn’t get more personal. We are all on this food safety journey together. Center for Produce Safety can be pivotal to that journey, helping to continually raise the bar to meet new hazards head-on.

What’s your call to action for CPS in 2024? Email me at [email protected].

To learn more about these and other CPS research projects, click here.