fbtechreview.com MARCH - APRIL 2026 8in myviewCurrently, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is espousing a new era of food safety that includes tech-enabled traceability, smarter tools and approaches for prevention and outbreak response, new business models and retail modernization, and food safety culture. This new era is encouraging more collaboration with the industry, growers, and vendors while elevating the field for more science and data-based decision making. At Fresh Del Monte we welcome this new approach and actively engage in deploying rigorous food safety mitigation programs while also endeavoring to continuously improve our programs through innovation.With the FDA's upcoming FSMA 204 requirements in traceability, we started--over a year ago--to systematically and methodically review several technological platforms that will not only ensure our compliance with regulatory requirements, but also allow us more transparency to our customers and consumers. Tech-enabled traceability will allow us to track products from field to fork more accurately in less time (hours to minutes) while reducing waste, enhancing transparency to the supply chain, and limiting the scope of any potential recall. We are also incorporating technology that will allow us active management and monitoring of key critical control points in a process at the facility level, one of the foundations for maintaining a high level of food safety readiness. The ability to have real-time active management of critical control points using sensors anywhere, at any time, has assisted in maintaining industry food safety programs. One critical control point that we manage, in large part through an active monitoring and management system, is chlorine levels.Chlorine has been widely studied and deployed in the fresh produce industry for many years to ensure we don't cross-contaminate our products during the washing process. There is an established minimum level of chlorine required to appropriately mitigate the growth of pathogens. Many of our facilities around the world leverage equipment and sensors that allow for active monitoring and management of chlorine levels. It is important to note that the fresh produce industry does not employ a "kill" step in the processing and packaging of its product line, nor is one commonly employed at the consumer end depending on the type of produce product. A kill step is a minimum of 4 log reduction in microbes. For example, for a million microbes, 4 log reduction would mean that the colony of one million is reduced to 100 or a 99.99 percent reduction and 5 log reduction would mean that the colony of one million is reduced to 10 or a 99.999 percent reduction. Active chlorine level monitoring and management give us the visibility to see our facilities' compliance with established mitigation programs, while also highlighting the speed and effectiveness of corrective actions where deviations occur. These active systems are also used in partnership with Operations and Engineering to continuously improve operations through training, equipment, and personnel development.The area of food safety in produce is constantly evolving and adapting, much like the pathogens we seek to control. Consumer perception of "fresh" is based on limited to no processing from field to fork, availability for seasonal products year-round, sourcing locally to internationally, and larger product offerings. Food safety is the number one priority for Fresh Del Monte and our industry as a whole, and a renewed focus on this has made a difference. For example, the Centers for Disease Control FOOD SAFETY IN THE PRODUCE INDUSTRY: APPLICATION OF NOVEL TECHNOLOGIES TO ENHANCE FOOD SAFETY PROGRAMS FROM GROWER TO PROCESSORBy Takashi Nakamura, Vice President, Fresh Del Monte Produce (FDP: NYSE)Takashi Nakamura
< Page 7 | Page 9 >