This week the federal government issued a progress report on actions it’s taken to strengthen food safety. The report is available on the CFIA site and it outlines significant progress made since the 2008 listeriosis outbreak and in response to the report delivered in 2009 by the independent investigator tasked to make recommendations around strengthening food safety systems.

Key to this has been new money it announced towards a five year Food and Consumer Safety Action Plan. Just one of the investments the government is making: $13 million for increased inspection capacity for meat and poultry processing facilities this year and next. It has also been linking up more laboratories to the PulseNet Canada network to allows DNA fingerprints across Canada to be compared and to identify sources of illness in real time. It outlined clearer roles and responsibilities in the event of health emergencies and new leadership with the appointment in May of a Chief Food Safety Officer. And it has improved communications outreach so it can better inform Canadians, including new online tools.

And the government is working with companies like ours to ensure the entire system – with public and private sector members – is working together. The new Agri-Subcommittee on Food Safety (ASFS) has met several times and these meetings are facilitating good cooperation between companies such as ourselves and Health Canada, the CFIA and food safety partners.

There’s still more to do however – for government and companies. We’ll be looking for evidence of progress on steps the government has committed to complete, such as finalizing new guidelines around recalls and the revised policy on Listeria monocytogenes.  We’re especially interested in seeing the approval of a range of new technologies that are commonly in use elsewhere in the world such as technologies that facilitate rapid-testing of foodborne pathogens.  It’s important for Canadian companies to have approval to use the range of food safety tools that are being used elsewhere, notably in the US, so that our systems are robust and complementary to regulatory requirements.  We are also anxious for government to provide ongoing reporting of industry compliance to the regulatory requirements so that the industry can hold ourselves accountable for continuous improvement against meeting and exceeding the standards.

Canadians want to know that companies and government officials are cooperating and moving ahead with improvements and better regulation and we are. There’s been a lot of progress since 2008, demonstrating that the lessons learned during that year are being implemented and backed up by good collaboration between the food industry and public health agencies.

Last Wednesday, September 15, I along with Maple Leaf Foods, President and CEO, Michael McCain had the pleasure of hosting our 2^nd annual Food Safety Symposium, at the Mississauga Convention Centre.  Following last year’s highly successful food safety summit which focused on best practices in Listeria control in ready-to-eat foods, this year’s theme centered on understanding and gaining support for the Global Food Safety Initiative (GFSI) within the Canadian landscape. 

Headed by a network of CEO’s and senior management from various sectors of the food industry, the Consumer Goods Forum launched the GFSI initiative about 11 years ago with a goal of building consensus among major retailers regarding a common approach to food safety systems and the third party audits that are conducted to assess compliance to standards. The audience heard from Kevin Swoffer, the chairman of the GFSI technical working groups who is based in the UK, and spends a great deal of his time with the GFSI staff in Paris, France and supporting the initiatives of the GFSI around the world.    Kevin described how the GFSI has evolved over the past decade and has created a common platform against which various food safety programs can be benchmarked.  Having this common approach allows the food industry to make food safety improvements more effectively and deliver safer products to consumers.   

The day was filled with informative discussions as each perspective was highlighted by the range of experiences offered by the speakers and panelists.  These talks truly underscored the importance of continually revising our risk management systems, emphasizing the fact that food safety is not simply limited to a specific sector rather it spans the entire food supply chain.  There was a good debate around how success is measured and one panelist shared some preliminary data to indicate that since implementing GFSI their retail chain had seen a 30% decline in recalls with suppliers whose facilities were certified against a GFSI benchmarked standard.  Ultimately, the goal is to be able to demonstrate a reduction in foodborne illness as a result of implementing effective food safety management systems.

We divided the program into two segments: a customer-focused panel and a manufacturer/supplier panel.   The customer-focused perspective shed light on how retailers and foodservice companies are working with their suppliers to achieve certification against one of the GFSI benchmarked auditing programs.   There was recognition that in most regions of Europe the GFSI is widely adopted whereas in North America the implementation has only recently begun. That said, one retailer indicated that the commitment by their suppliers to receive certification has been very good and momentum is building in the Canadian and US marketplace.

The  manufacturer and supplier’s panel explored the hands-on experiences of meeting the GFSI requirements.  The panel was represented by a primary pork processor, a grain milling company, an artisan bakery, a major North American CPG company, and finally a non-profit organization that owns a GFSI benchmarked program for fresh fruits and vegetable growers.  Certainly a very broad cross-section of the food industry!  It was clear in this discussion that there is more than one approach to achieving certification of a food production site, but the common theme was the need to have each function within the company, including operations, logistics and purchasing, product development and marketing as well as the quality and food safety group participating in the process and doing their part. It was stated by one panelist that the key to success in achieving certification against a GFSI benchmarked program was commitment from the top to provide the financial support and vision.  At Maple Leaf, our experience would support this fact, that without multi-function participation in the food safety system and strong senior management commitment, the programs will not be effectively implemented and achieving certification will be difficult, if not impossible.   

One of the more insightful presentations of the day came from Dr. Les Bourquin of Michigan State University who discussed his efforts to develop food safety training programs for employees in developing countries.  The training modules are designed to support the general systems that are required for a food production site to become certified against a GFSI standard.  Measuring effectiveness through assessment of behavior change as a result of the training was a key element of Dr. Bourquin’s talk.

 At Maple Leaf we firmly believe that sharing food safety knowledge and best practices among industry sectors and stakeholders is critical for success and we will continue to foster this approach.  We were gratified that over 200 people were in attendance and so many were open to sharing their knowledge.  It demonstrates the commitment of our industry to engage and continuously improve in the area of food safety.  I would like to once again thank all of those in attendance.   The opportunity to learn from each other’s insights opens up many avenues and I look forward to sharing our success with you through our future symposiums.

One of the commitments in Maple Leaf’s Food Safety Pledge is to share information and knowledge with government and others in the industry to raise food safety standards for all food production.  To that end, for almost two years now we, along with other stakeholders, have been actively participating,as Health Canada and the CFIA  review federal standards and regulations pertaining to Listeria in Ready to Eat Foods (RTE) and the prevention of Listeriosis.  This consultative process is being done with the view to further strengthen the scientific foundation of the regulatory policy directed at Listeria prevention and control in RTE foods.

Health Canada issued its revised draft policy on company practices pertaining to Listeria – “Policy on Listeria monocytogenes in Ready-to-Eat Foods” – and we responded with our comments during the period set by Health Canada as part of its consultation process.

In our view, the draft policy would represent good progress towards implementing the recommendations of Sheila Weatherill , the independent advisor tasked by the government to review Canada’s food safety system in the wake of the 2008 Listeriosis outbreak.  The draft policy follows very closely the scientific approach that is outlined in the Codex Alimentarius guidelines for Listeria in RTE foods, which smartly recognizes that risk from this pathogen is a function of cell population growth during shelf life and not merely a function of bacterial prescence.

Among the recommendations we made to Health Canada about the revised policy, was the suggestion that more be done to encourage testing for Listeria on non-food contact surfaces. Global best practice and our recent in-plant experience would prove that aggressively testing the plant environment where food products are prepared, and not just the end product and the surfaces that the food touches, is most effective. This is an approach we are taking over and above federal requirements today. And we believe national standards should do more to encourage testing non-food contact sites.

We encouraged the government to consider expanding the types of testing methods that industry in Canada can use.  Speed in learning about a problem early is essential.  Currently, it can take too long to get test results back from labs. Better and more rapid methods exist and are being used in other countries that can cut our time to results from about 6 – 7 days down to 2 or 3 days.  Being able to act on results four or five days sooner is a major improvement to food safety, and we think the revised policy should allow industry to adopt those new technologies.  Many other countries throughout the world have access to this more modern and rapid techniques, but in Canada the industry is limited to a very narrow definition of approved rapid methods that frankly, are not very rapid.

The fact that the tragic events which precipitated this policy review started with bacteria embedded in a deep harbourage point in our slicing equipment, is one of the reasons why we placed a strong emphasis on best practices in sanitation.  We believe the new policy should have a stronger focus on the importance of sanitation and related issues, such as sanitary equipment and facility design, that facilitates best practices in sanitation.  The purpose of having an aggressive environmental Listeria testing program is to measure effectiveness of the sanitation programs within a facility, so a stronger linkage in the policy between the testing program and sanitation would be appropriate.

That said, there are other issues that need to be addressed to help ensure food safety across the system.  We continue to make the case that different regulations for facilities that are provincially regulated, rather than federally regulated, and different rules concerning imported foods, constitute a vulnerability in consumer protection.

With the public consultation process now closed, work is now proceeding to review all the comments that were received with respect to the new Listeria policy.  We hope that after reviewing all the submissions, including our own, that Health Canada and CFIA will move quickly to get the revised policy and enhanced regulatory requirements in place by the end of the year.

Even when the new policy is made public, we will not stop searching for new ways to enhance our food safety practices. We have come to understand that food safety is not a destination but a journey.  There will always be new challenges and new ways of combating them. That’s why even now we don’t simply meet but, in many cases, exceed federal requirements.  And going forward, we will set our standards, not solely against the new policy and federal regulations, but also against our aspiration to be a global leader in food safety.