By Mary Pickels
Tribune-Review

GREENSBURG, Pa. — As part of a statewide tour focusing on food safety, Pennsylvania Secretary of Agriculture Dennis Wolff visited the Westmoreland County Food Bank in Delmont on Monday.

State officials are conducting the tour as part of the Strategy for Agriculture and Food Excellence. The initiative is a comprehensive plan to address food safety and defense from farm to the fork.

"We've been working on SAFE for the last year," Wolff said. "It's an umbrella over food safety in Pennsylvania."

SAFE is a cooperative effort between the state departments of Agriculture and Health in coordination with the Pennsylvania Emergency Management Agency and Office of Homeland Security. It includes input from food processors, retailers and health officials.

Wolff said the numerous departments are trying to put in place a comprehensive plan to ensure state consumers are being provided with safe food.

Information gleaned from the tours of food banks, food production and distribution centers and restaurants, along with roundtable discussions in numerous communities, will be used to produce a "road map," Wolff said, of the initiative the state hopes to put into place in Pennsylvania.

"We want to make sure we are a leader, taking advantage of all resources available," he said, to make food production better than it has been.

"Our modern food system is complex and depends on many factors, from the initial production in the field to the final product served to consumers," Wolff said. "These tours are an important step in understanding the precautions Pennsylvania producers, companies, manufacturers and organizations are taking to ensure the safety of our food supply."

"We are trying to be ahead of the curve, and if a challenge arises we can do a traceback," he said.

Food safety, he said, includes not only protecting food from pathogens such as E.coli and salmonella. Since the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, Wolff said, food safety has focused "more on intentional contamination of food products."

He said officials on the tour have found some security measures already in place, from trucks sealed after loading until delivery to cameras on restaurant salad bars.

Some businesses hire outside auditors to recommend ways to improve products and prevent contamination, he said.

"There are some new methods of protecting the food supply food handlers are doing that we were not aware of," Wolff said.

Yesterday, food bank executive director Marlene Kozak and operations manager Kevin Povich gave the state officials a tour of the food bank warehouse. The food bank supplies 50 county food pantries and nearly 15,000 residents with food each month.

"We have developed, with the help of the USDA and other organizations, a manual for food safety as well as brochures and posters to be given out and displayed at all distributions," Kozak said. "These items explain food safety and what to look for in terms of what is safe and unsafe to be consumed."

Povich pointed out other safety implementations, from temperature regulation to identification tags on food pallets. In case of a recall, for instance, he said, the tags would help food bank officials determine the source of the shipment and alert food pantries.

Additional safety measures long in place include refusing to accept baby food in glass jars, Kozak said, and abiding by the "use by" dates on products.

"We're very particular," she said. "We don't want bad food getting out there to the people who get food from us. Our motto is, 'When in doubt, throw it out.' "

In addition, several food bank staff members are certified in safe food handling.

The tour was to include a roundtable discussion last night in the Westmoreland County Conservation District Center in Hempfield.

Copyright 2008 Tribune Review Publishing Company