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Published on: 9/7/2007
Last Visited: 2/24/2008
To learn more about the subject, we turned to Mansour Samadpour.A microbiologist and founder of a food safety company, he became well known to many in the produce trade when, in the aftermath of the Fall 2006 spinach crisis, Natural Selection Foods turned to him for assistance in revising its food safety program.Here is how the Los Angeles Times described the meeting:
Days after the tragedy unfolded in mid-September, the company hired food safety microbiologist Mansour Samadpour.Known for his no-nonsense approach, Samadpour sat down with Daniels and Earthbound Farm President Charles Sweat and warned them that they were delusional if they thought it wouldn't happen again.
"Another bullet is coming your way," he warned."Are pathogens in raw product reasonably likely to occur?Some say yes, some say no.The group saying no is delusional," Samadpour said.
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Mira Slott, Pundit Investigator and Special Projects Editor, spoke with Dr. Samadpour:
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Dr. Mansour SamadpourFounder, PrincipalIEH Laboratories & Consulting Group
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We appreciate Dr. Samadpour speaking with us.He has been around a long time, going back to the famous Jack-in-the-Box outbreak.He has a long-established reputation among many of the food safety experts who have worked in beef, and he is frequently called on by the media for comment.
We confess that we want to believe.Although testing is expensive, it seems to us much, much less expensive than food safety outbreaks.So if we can really test everything in less than 12 hours and then release it confident in its safety, it would be worth the price.
Yet even after reading Dr. Samadpour's words and recognizing him as both intelligent and knowledgeable, we find ourselves still asking questions:
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When Dr. Samadpour tells us about his test and procedures we, of course, get excited about the implications for the industry.But without a peer-reviewed assessment, we really don't know if the things that Dr. Samadpour cites are accurate or not.
This has nothing to do with Dr. Samadpour's ethics.We have no reason to think he is anything but scrupulously honest.
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Samadpour predicts that four of Earthbound's finished lots, nearly 4 tons, will test positive every year, most often in summer.
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Part of the problem in resolving this issue is that, although in media reports Dr. Samadpour is often referred to as a consultant and articles will say things implying he is acting in a consulting capacity - for example, the LA Times article explains that "Samadpour advised Sweat and Daniels to immediately begin checking all greens for pathogens, which no one in the industry was doing" - our discussion with Dr. Samadpour indicates that he has made his company, consultant, test developer, laboratory and more all in one.
Although this doesn't mean his advice is incorrect, there is something sort of disconcerting about a situation like this.One would prefer that one's consultant didn't have a financial interest in one outcome over another.If Dr. Samadpour recommends spending $3 million dollars a year leasing land to increase buffer zones, he gets nothing.If someone uses his company to run a testing program, he could have a large continuing income.
We don't want to make too much of this.We have no reason to believe he hasn't always given his best advice, but it strikes us as a consideration for many people.We suspect his advice to the trade would be seen as more influential if people did not see him as having a financial stake in the outcome.
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Much as to use Dr. Samadpour's analogy, we assume that someone who passes a French test at a University actually learned some French.
The fear, and it strikes us as a reasonable one, is that the promotion of testing will bias industry efforts in favor of testing - at the expensive of other efforts.
In other words, if Processor One doubles its buffer zones, triples its water testing, sanitizes the plant twice as frequently, has its growers put traps in twice as often and Processor Two does none of this but tests, the market, composed of layman produce buyers, not microbiologists, will assume the testing provides a better security on food safety and go that route.
Dr. Samadpour makes a strong argument when he is asked whether an extra $3 million should be spent on testing or other food safety systems, he replies: "Look at your budget and proportion it out.
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We also take to heart Dr. Samadpour's admonition about retail-driven testing.Too many processors that do not have comprehensive testing programs have implemented testing on some finished product to suit a particular customer, such as Jack-in-the-Box or Costco.This seems likely to cause problems down the road.As Dr. Samadpour explains:
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Dr. Samadpour is obviously very intelligent and knowledgeable.We as an industry and any processor as a company would be foolish not to pay attention to what he says.He has obviously thought about food safety for a long time. At the same time, most of his experience seems to be in meat, and produce is not meat.Tests that may not be "new" can be "new in produce," which means we don't have the data history to judge some of these things. His involvement in so many aspects of the business inevitably raises questions, justified or not, about conflicts of interest.Many a produce executive wouldn't hire a financial advisor who gets paid more by recommending certain funds as opposed to other ones.By the same standard, ideally, one would like a food safety consultant who doesn't gain or lose by the decision to do testing as opposed to increase buffer zones. The problem is not testing per se; it is the marketing of testing as part of a food safety program as opposed to quietly doing testing to verify everything else works. Dr. Samadpour offers the industry important guidance in saying that testing is essential to verify we are investing food safety dollars in the right places. He also correctly identifies customer-driven testing without a comprehensive program as likely to cause real problems. A key piece of information is missing: How does the FDA feel about the use of testing to limit the scope of a recall? The industry could benefit by additional data, and Dr. Samadpour should be encouraged to write and publish in a respected peer-reviewed journal an article on his test and methodology so that the science behind what he is doing is transparent and confirmed by independent scientists.
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This is a tough and important industry issue, and we thank Dr. Samadpour for being willing to share his perspective with the trade.He deserves commendation for being willing to speak out on such a controversial issue.
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