Lack of awareness of US Food and Drug Administration food safety regulations and site-specific critical control points exposes urban farmers and consumers to high liability and risk of microbial foodborne illness outbreaks. A growing number of beginning urban farmers from non-traditional agriculture backgrounds with small-sized fresh fruit and vegetable operations has yet to be reached, trained and equipped with hands-on implementation knowledge of the Food Safety Modernization Act Produce Safety Rule. Long-term goals of the proposed project are to 1) develop and deliver highly-customized food safety curriculum, courses, teaching approaches and best practices for hard-to-reach and underserved urban agriculture audiences; and 2) create a Western Regional Urban Agriculture Training concentration at California State Polytechnic University, Pomona to complement the FDA/USDA NIFA Western Regional Food Safety Center headquartered at Oregon State University. Objectives: 1) Modify FDA recognized core curriculum entry-level competencies for integration into existing college courses with food safety content across food and agriculture science disciplines, 2) Develop a new Urban Agriculture Food Safety college course with continuing education unit and professional certificate options, 3) Identify, deliver, and implement both FDA standard and highly-customized food safety education programs to hard-to-reach urban farmers. Project outcomes will reduce risk of foodborne illness outbreaks, build a cadre of PSA (Produce Safety Alliance) trainers in California who can provide technical support to urban food production and processing operations, and train a diverse workforce engaged in their local communities while pursuing agriculture science as a route to STEM careers that support sustainable agriculture systems.
USDA Food Safety Outreach Program (FSOP) Project.