
Speakers – June 2, 2022 – Concurrent 4A
Food Safety on Fresh Produce
Drew McDonald – Taylor Farms
Drew is the Senior Vice President Quality & Food Safety at Taylor Fresh Foods, Salinas CA. He has 27 years experience in Fresh Produce and Fresh Foods. He oversees the quality and food safety programs across the food service, retail, and deli operations. Drew works with an impressive team developing and managing appropriate and practical quality and food safety programs for fresh food and produce products. Over the course of his career he has worked with growers and processors of fresh food and produce items all over the world. He currently serves on numerous food safety-related technical committees and has participated in the authorship of many produce food safety guidelines. He is the current chairman of the Center for Produce Food Safety’s Technical Committee and the outgoing Chairman of United Fresh’s Technical Council. Drew received his education from Lawrence University in Wisconsin.
PRESENTATION:
Post-Harvest Interventions From an Industry Perspective
Tom Sidebottom – FDA (Retired)
Tom Sidebottom recently joined the private sector as a regulatory consultant. He has over a 32-year federal career with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. At the FDA, he was the Director of the San Francisco Laboratory for 11 years. There Tom managed a diverse group of scientists responsible for protecting public health. Their core focus was to provide analytical expertise and problem-solving approaches to emerging public health issues in chemistry and microbiological testing. He also played a critical role in leading the design and construction of a new federal laboratory, which opened in September 2019. He has a strong international and global perspective having supported communications with the EU, UK, Canada, Pacific Island states, and provincial-national regulatory authorities from India and China.
Tom earned his B.S. degree in Entomology from the University of Maryland and has extensive knowledge and experience with FD&C Act regulatory testing and compliance inspections on a broad range of regulated products manufactured and imported into the United States. He is currently a member of several industry associations; Pacific Southwest AOAC, International Association of Food Protection – California affiliate (CalFP), Western Association of Food & Drug Officials (WAFDO), Customs Brokers Freight Forwarders Association of Northern California (CBFANC), and recently was an invited panelist at the Food Technology Summit Event sponsored by Western Growers Association, Yuma Center of Excellence and Center for Produce Safety held on February 2, 2022. Event covered by the Yuma Sun in an article titled “Relationship building: FDA, ag industry discuss how to work together” published on February 13, 2022.
PRESENTATION:
Post-Harvest Interventions From a Government Perspective
Paul Moyer, Co-founder – Moyer’s AppleProducts, Clean Works and Clean Works Medical
Paul is the Chief Networker and Idea Man behind Clēan Works and Moyers Apple Product. Paul’s leadership style inspires his team to continue to innovate cutting edge solutions healthcare and agricultural industries. Both businesses have a substantial national and international presence.
Paul is a 9th-generation fruit farmer in the Niagara Peninsula of Southern Ontario. He is the founder and co-owner of Moyers Apple Products, based in Beamsville, Ontario. Moyers Apple Products won an Ontario Centre of Excellence award and received the 2017 Premier’s Award for Agri-Food Innovation Excellence from the Government of Ontario for his Clēan Verification process to tackle issues of food contamination.
In 2017, Paul and his partners formed Clēan Works. In 2019, they won the world’s top food safety award from the International Association of Food Protection. Paul and his partners created Clēan Works Medical after receiving the call to action from the Canadian government to respond to the COVID-19 pandemic. After receiving a call to action from the Canadian government, Clēan Works Medical was formed and received Health Canada approval as the only Canadian tech company to sanitize N95 masks and other Personal Protective Equipment (PPE).
Paul is from Vineland, Ontario, and has a Bachelor of Science degree in Economics and Marketing from Auburn University, in Auburn, Alabama. He has an associate’s degree in Microbiology in the field of Agricultural Science at Alfred State College, SUNY (State University of New York) College of Technology, in Alfred, New York.
PRESENTATION:
Bringing Novel Technologies to Market
Dr. Keith Warriner, Professor, Department of Food Science – University of Guelph
Dr. Warriner is currently a Professor within the Department of Food Science at University of Guelph, Canada. Dr. Warriner received his BSc in Food Science from the University of Nottingham, UK and PhD in Microbial Physiology from the University College of Wales Aberystwyth, UK. He later went on to work on biosensors within the University of Manchester, UK and subsequently returned to the University of Nottingham to become a Research Fellow in Food Microbiology. He joined the Faculty of the University of Guelph in 2002.
During the last twenty five years in the field of microbiology and food safety research, Dr. Warriner has published more than 200 papers, book chapters, patents, and conference abstracts. His research interests are focused on enhancing food safety within meat processing, fresh cut sectors and more recently, in the area of marijuana edibles. To this end, his research team have advanced knowledge in the area of emerging pathogens, intervention technologies and development of biosensor devices to detection of foodborne hazards. His research in UV is developing novel decontamination methods based on gas phase hydroxyl-radicals for treating food surfaces and more recently N95 masks along with other personal protective equipment. He was awarded the Ontario Innovation of the Year award in 2017, OCE Mind to Market award in 2018, IAFP Food Safety Innovation award in 2019 and University of Guelph Innovation award in 2020. He is frequently contacted by the media to provide commentary on food safety issues and is the past President of the Ontario Food Protection Association. He is currently the Chair of the University of Guelph Biosafety committee, Director of the OMAFRA HQP Scholarship program and Associate Editor for several journals. Dr Warriner has visited Beijing, Zhengzhou, Dalian and Guangzhou for information exchange visits. He has held the position of Graduate Coordinator within the Department of Food Science and Director of the Food Safety and Quality program.
PRESENTATION:
Fresh Produce Safety: The Need for Post-Harvest Interventions
To date, food safety interventions have focused on pre-harvest measures and testing to stop pathogens being introduced into the fresh produce chain. However, due the environmental distribution and endemic nature of human pathogens such control can be challenging. In addition, testing programs typically miss pathogens due to sporadic occurrence of the target that can be present below the limit of detection. Consequently, there is interest in re-visiting post-harvest intervention methods to enhance the microbiological safety of fresh produce. Previously washing fresh produce in sanitizers was viewed as a control step although it has subsequently found to lead to cross-contamination between batches if not controlled. Consequently, there is a need for innovative post-harvest approaches to decontaminate fresh produce to complement pre-harvest approaches. The presentation will provide an overview of our understanding of sources of contamination, relevant pathogens and current limitations of post-harvest washing.