SB 80 and Preventive Controls
As a direct result of the 2009 outbreak, the Georgia Legislature passed Senate Bill
80 to enhance the Georgia Department of Agriculture’s manufactured foods program.
Senator John Bulloch authored the bill, which required mandatory testing and reporting of ready-to-eat manufactured foods and ingredients produced in the state. The bill
requires firms to notify the Georgia Department of Agriculture of any positive test result obtained within 24 hours even if the product remained in the control of the company. Other provisions outline the department’s ability to recognize preventive
controls such as a written food safety plan and adjust the mandatory testing frequency
accordingly. The department also must
promulgate regulations to outline the provisions of the law. This was a major challenge.
Most state programs utilize federal laws,
regulations and guidelines to develop science-based regulations. In Georgia’s case,
there were no federal standards or guidelines to reference. As the development of
these regulations began, several concerns
quickly came to light. The issue of presumptive positive test results and resampling had to be addressed: if a company
conducts a test and receives a presumptive
positive, it must either confirm the presumptive with the same sample or report
the presumptive as a positive test result.
What a company can’t do is use a negative
result from a different sample to negate the
positive result. The second issue was the
burden of “test and hold” for lots being
sampled. Most food manufacturers have
elected to hold product lots pending negative test results. If a positive is obtained,
they must report it to the Department of
Agriculture within 24 hours. However, they
do not have to recall that particular product because it is not in commerce.
The Beginning of the New Program
Today, the Georgia Department of Agriculture Consumer Protection Division has
four sections: dairy, food processing, retail food and poultry graders. In addition to
the development of regulations related to SB 80, the department faced additional challenges in developing a regulatory section for the program. Previously, our retail and
manufactured foods program had been a combined section consisting of approximately 17,000 regulated facilities. These included major food processing operations,
grocery stores and convenience stores. The Georgia General Assembly agreed to fund
four positions for this program. Under the leadership of Georgia Department of Agriculture Commissioner Gary W. Black, the program has grown to eight positions by
redirecting resources throughout the division. Black’s commitment to food safety,
coupled with a risk-based inspection approach and an “educate as we regulate” philosophy, has been instrumental to the enhancement of this program.
versity provides training to regulatory
participants, who are an excellent re-
source for new hires, and those needing
continuing education units. Our sanitari-
ans are required to complete all 38 on-
line courses to meet level-two training
status. The International Food Protection
Training Institute (IFPTI) in Battle
Creek, MI, has also made trainings avail-
able that previously were rarely available
to state programs. In addition to Internet
and internal training, we have logged
more than 2,400 man-hours of training
hosted by IFPTI, FDA, USDA and other
sources. The FDA’s Training Branch has
also had a significant increase in the
number of slots offered to state food
safety programs. The courses include
FD150 (Food GMPs), FD151 (Food In-
spection Techniques and Evidence De-
velopment) and FD152 (Food Processing
and Technology), which are now part of
the robust training requirements for all
food processing specialists in Georgia.
The commitment of FDA and the train-
ing of state food safety regulators have
made instrumental enhancements to our
program, and the continued partnership
and support between FDA and IFPTI are
a vital component of an integrated food
safety system.
However, this training equation is
missing one vital piece: industry. The
training currently being offered to regula-
tory personnel must also be available to
industry. Furthermore, some of this
training should be conducted with a bal-
ance of regulatory and industry partici-
pants. As we move to a food safety
system focused more on prevention, we
must train together on the latest scien-
tific principles associated with food-
borne pathogen control. Industry also
brings an invaluable component to the
table: the more regulators learn about
the preventive controls being utilized,
their implementation and the Sanitation
Standard Operating Procedures (SSOPs)
within a facility, the more we recognize a
company’s commitment to food safety—
thus lowering the risk of the facility. This
will allow regulators to focus resources
on higher-risk facilities. Industry has uti-
lized cutting-edge technologies and sys-
tems to ensure the safety of the foods
they produce. In many cases, the regula-
“
”
“The development of the
Georgia Department of
Agriculture’s Food
Processing Section as a
stand-alone group began
shortly following the
Salmonella outbreak
associated with peanuts
and peanut products
in 2009.”
Training
In the past, food safety training has been difficult for state and local programs. The
transfer of knowledge has mostly been on a local level. The funding necessary for staff
to travel to out-of-state trainings, coupled with the lack of availability to state and local
regulators, was problematic. Now we have more training opportunities than ever before. The FDA launched the Office of Regulatory Affairs University. This online uni-
