Senate Committee on Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry
October 8, 1997

Good Morning, my name is Alan Janzen and I am representing the National Cattlemen's Beef Association (NCBA) where I currently serve as vice-chairman of our Beef Safety Committee. I am from Henderson, Nebraska where I am co-owner of Circle Five Feed Yard. My family also has 1,750 cows and a backgrounding operation near Brewster, Nebraska.

I am currently the President-elect of the Nebraska Cattlemen organization and I have been appointed by the Secretary of Agriculture to serve on USDA's National Advisory Committee on Meat and Poultry Inspection.

I personally, and on behalf of the more than 230,000 NCBA members across the country, want to thank you for this opportunity to address the issue of food safety in general and how can we work together, from the farm to the table, to prevent crises like those of the past couple of months from happening again.

The problem of E.coli O157:H7 is important to all of us. We, meaning beef producers, packers, processors, retailers, food service, consumers, you, as our elected representatives, and of course the USDA and its researchers and meat and poultry inspection workforce, must be engaged in finding solutions. We all have an important role.

Finding effective ways to deal with E. coli is important not simply because it is a public health issue, but because understanding how to accomplish this should also reduce the risk of other potential food-borne pathogens that could exist at any time on raw meat, poultry, fish or other commodities in our food supply.

All of us who play a role from the farm to the table in ensuring the food consumers receive is safe and wholesome, must work together to design and implement a broad based initiative to prevent food-borne illness. In so doing, we will also help eliminate the devastating effects these situations have on livestock producers, packers, processors and retailers.

As beef cattle producers, we are on record as committed to contributing to finding solutions to the E.coli problem as well as any other potential food-borne pathogens.

With respect to the legislation recently proposed by the USDA, the NCBA has a number of concerns. First and foremost, we believe there is an urgent need to focus all of our efforts on preventing problems. Based on our analysis of the USDA legislative proposal, it is not clear how the additional authority would have prevented or enhanced the management of the recent E. coli incidents.

We believe that a number of steps need to be taken to address this situation, including:

1. The HACCP based meat and poultry inspection system must be operating efficiently and effectively as soon as possible. It is of critical importance that the USDA inspection workforce is fully trained to be part of this new system.

2. Companies must have an opportunity to employ new technologies to help reduce the risk of E. coli and other potential pathogens. In this regard, it is very difficult for cattle producers to understand why the FDA Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition has not made a decision on low dose radiation after more than 3 years of review.

3. A strategic plan for a prevention oriented, farm to table food, safety research, technology development and transfer that engages the resources of the public and private sector, must be developed and fully funded. This research strategy must establish a set of risk based priorities which reflect the appropriate allocation of resources from the farm to the table, as well as, short and long term projects.

4. There needs to be a focus on education of food handlers and consumers regarding the proper handling and cooking of raw agricultural products which are, by definition not sterile.

The National Cattlemen's Beef Association has been investing more than $5 million per year to address the issue of food safety. This investment ranges from pre and post harvest research to producer education through the Beef Quality Assurance Program, as well as our involvement in the national consumer education effort planned and conducted in concert with the USDA and others.

In the full text of my remarks I will provide you an overview of current public and private sector investments in food safety research, technology development, transfer and education. In the interest of time, I will provide that information for the record.

I will conclude by reiterating that all of us, from the farm to the table, our elected representatives, regulatory and research agencies must focus efforts on prevention of food-borne illness. At this time we do not fully understand how the proposed USDA legislation would contribute to prevention of the E. coli problems that we face. However, we look forward to continuing a dialog which will result in meaningful progress in the future.

Thank you for this opportunity to represent the views of the beef industry.

The National Cattlemen's Beef Association Statement on Food Safety Research

Since the late 1980's, cattlemen focused our time, and significant financial resources on ensuring we remain the world leader in the production of safe, wholesome, high quality beef and beef products. Our Beef Quality Assurance program is a national effort which has and will play a prominent role in disseminating information to cattle producers, ensuring we continue to produce the safest, highest quality beef in the world.

For over 10 years we have supported the establishment of the new science based, HACCP oriented meat inspection system. We also established a Blue Ribbon Taskforce to identify the research and technology transfer needs.

In the short term, we have invested in the development and adoption of new technologies such as the Steam Vacuum to remove potential contaminants in the packing plant. We have also invested in a number of studies to develop other antimicrobial treatments. These efforts are coupled with research to determine where, when and how microbiological contamination occurs.

We also believe that in the short term, we need to seriously consider development of methods to "pasteurize" ground meats just as we pasteurize milk and other products for human consumption.

In the long term we all need to support a comprehensive research portfolio.

In 1994, the E. coli O157:H7 Blue Ribbon Taskforce recommended that in the short term we focus approximately 12 percent of the research portfolio on the pre-harvest side of the equation. Annually we invest approximately $5 million in food safety related research and education. Our most recent analysis shows the NCBA has allocated 9.5 percent of this budget in the pre-harvest area for a total of $600,000 of producer investment. We also are investing more than $600,000 in our national beef quality assurance program (BQA) effort. This program currently focuses on prevention of drug and chemical residues in beef, as well as the prevention of quality defects through improved animal care and management. As research provides us with management practices which could reduce the risk of E. coli O157:H7, the BQA program and network will be an important vehicle to disseminate this information.

On the public sector side, a search of the CRIS data base provided a summary of 121 university based food safety research projects, 9 of which relate directly to on farm research relating to E. coli O157:H7.

A detailed analysis of the Agricultural Research Service portfolio indicates they have 52 food safety projects underway. Those involving microbiology involve an investment of over $24 million, and 63 scientist years or full time equivalents. Of this total, approximately $11 million is oriented to preharvest research (46% of the total), of which over $2 million is directly targeted to E. coli O157:H7 research on the farm.

From the industry perspective, in the last 3 years, packers and processors have invested more than $2.4 million in development and validation of new technologies to reduce the risk of E. coli O157:H7, and other potential pathogens. These research projects have resulted in the industry investing over $65 million during the last 3 years to put new technologies in place. Many of you may be aware, several major beef processing companies are in the process of installing steam cabinet pasteurization systems in all of their plants. These investments, and the implementation of HACCP have and will continue to reduce the risk of food borne pathogens in the future.

Last, but not least another element of our strategy, is to aggressively support a comprehensive consumer education program. We are a cooperator with other commodity and trade groups, the government and consumer groups to deliver a comprehensive food safety education which will invest over 1/2 million dollars this year. This effort is just getting underway and is a component of the Presidents Food Safety Initiative.

We recognize and support the role of everyone from the farm to the table in doing their respective part to prevent food-borne illness. We fully support a comprehensive portfolio of research and technology transfer.

Despite the recent challenges we have faced, there has been a great deal of progress made since 1993. We are putting in place the new HACCP based inspection systems, new technologies are being employed to reduce risk, new technologies such as electron beam irradiation or "electronic pasteurization" need to be approved and utilized. Last but not least, we need to strategically design and fully fund a comprehensive farm to table food safety research and technology transfer program. Discussions regarding other related issues should be conducted after we ensure we have done all we can to ensure successful implementation of HACCP, invested in technology development and transfer and made an appropriate commitment to an aggressive research program to prevent food-borne illness.