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Food Safety and Inspection
Service United States Department of Agriculture Washington, D.C. 20250-3700 |
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Food Safety and Inspection
Service United States Department of Agriculture Washington, D.C. 20250-3700 |
Office of the Under Secretary for Food Safety
U.S. Department of Agriculture
Remarks prepared for delivery by Caren Wilcox, Deputy Under Secretary for Food Safety, before the public meeting on the HACCP-based Inspection Models Project, March 30, 2000, Rosslyn, VA.
Good morning. Welcome to the fourth public meeting on the HACCP-based Inspection models project. This meeting honors our commitment to meet with you, our constituents, at key stages during the process of this project to keep you up-to-date and to present any new data generated through the project.
As you know, USDA has carried out a science-based food safety strategy over the past five years, and we have made progress on many fronts. HACCP has been successfully implemented, and we are seeing substantial reductions in the prevalence of Salmonella in raw meat and poultry products produced under HACCP.
Progress has also been made through the President’s Food Safety Initiative, which set in motion a number of activities that have contributed greatly to reducing foodborne illness. Improved surveillance and outbreak response, new food safety research, and developments in the science of risk assessment are among these improvements.
The President’s Food Safety Council is building on the achievements of the Food Safety Initiative through comprehensive strategic planning and budget coordination activities. This Administration is committed to continuing this progress until we can honestly say that the food supply is as safe as it possibly can be. That is why we are here today.
As with all of our food safety initiatives, this project has been developed through a very public process, with ample opportunity for input. In addition to holding public meetings and publishing Federal Register notices with the opportunity to comment, we have consulted with the National Advisory Committee on Meat and Poultry Inspection and the National Advisory Committee on Microbiological Criteria for Foods. We welcome input on the models project because it will help us to design a system that is the best it can possibly be. We will not move forward with implementing the new system unless we are confident it is effective in protecting the public health.
I want to thank you in advance for your interest and involvement and look forward to the substantive discussions ahead.
For Further Information:
FSIS Congressional and Public Affairs Staff
Phone: (202) 720-3897
Fax: (202) 720-5704