"The business of food safety education is to persuade or convince someone to change unsafe food handling behaviors. In this case there are many `someones' along the farm-to-table continuum," says Marjorie Davidson, Ph.D., education team leader for FDA's Food Safety Initiative. "Not only must we provide people with information we must do it in a manner that results in changing unsafe food handling behaviors to safe food handling behaviors, " she said. "Constant reinforcement of educational messages is important to sustaining behavior change."

In FY 1999, producers, retailers, the food service industry and consumers were the focus of concerted efforts to change unsafe food handling practices into safe food handling practices. Sporting such names as GAPS and GMPS, and Fight BAC!™, research-based education was conducted all along the farm-to-table continuum.

Educating producers is a complex challenge due to the diversity of products, diversity of growing conditions and transportation systems, and perhaps the greatest challenge of all—diversity of language and culture of people around the world who grow and ship food to U. S. consumers. Producer education programs in FY 99 began to tackle these challenges. For international activities see page 27, International Outreach.

FDA provided funds to augment a Good Agricultural Practices (GAPs) Grant that the U.S. Department of Agriculture awarded to Cornell University to develop training programs and train domestic producers on GAPs. Producers in five key states — New York, Florida, California, Washington and Michigan — will be targeted for the training programs. Retail Education

Keeping consumers safe when they eat out of the home is the responsibility of many entities including retailers, food service vending operations, institutions and regulators. As part of the President's 1997 Food Safety Initiative, the Food Safety Training and Education Alliance (FSTEA) was established to share food safety training materials, promote and implement the Food Code and develop multicultural communication techniques.

How is that being accomplished? In FY 99, FSTEA launched a website as a method of sharing information with a large, diverse group of individuals with a common need. Accessible through www.foodsafety.gov, the website includes information on current activities, provides a link to databases of training materials and listings of available training courses.

Gary German, FDA's co-facilitator of FSTEA, said the alliance has been successful in developing competencies for regulators, trainers and industry officials. "These competencies provide national uniform education and experience standards that should be met by those who regulate the food industry, those who provide training for the food industry and those who work in the food industry," he said.

In addition to developing the competencies, FSTEA also developed criteria for reviewing the quality of education materials that are under development or completed.

Another project completed in FY 99 is the compilation of responses to the 1998 multi-cultural materials needs survey. The training materials identified in the survey are available from the National Agricultural Library.

Using video teleconferencing technology, FSTEA hosted a training program for trainers and educators in April 1999. The video conference attracted a nationwide audience who heard updates on FSTEA activities, training resources and information about National Food Safety Education Month.

Learning the content of the Food Code, a nationally-recognized reference published by FDA that guides retail outlets such as restaurants and grocery stores and institutions such as nursing homes on how to prevent foodborne illness, can be done by reading through the more than 400 pages of information it contains. Or, you can take a class.

In FY 99, FDA provided "Train the Trainer" classes on the Food Code to develop a cadre of qualified instructors to reach the local food service community. Six sessions were held across the country. The course covered instruction on effective training techniques and the requirements of the 1999 Food Code. Local, state and federal regulators use the Food Code as a model to help develop or update their own food safety rules and to be consistent with national food regulatory policy. Also, many of the over 1 million retail food establishments apply the Food Code provisions to their own operations.

"Participants who completed all five days of the course were expected to return to their respective organizations and conduct Food Code courses for their coworkers, industry and other interested parties," said Gary German, director of FDA's Division of Human Resources Development.

For consumers, the food safety message was "risk". "We want consumers to understand why some are more `at-risk' for foodborne illness than others and what foods are considered risky because of their association with foodborne illness," said Marjorie Davidson, Ph.D., FSI's team leader for education.

Senior citizens are one such group that is at-risk for foodborne illness and for whom special education initiatives were developed in FY 99. A three-pronged approach is providing seniors with safe food handling information. Debuting in May 1999, the Seniors and Food Safety website is providing Internet-savvy seniors and others with specific information on why they are at-risk for foodborne illness; how changes in food distribution plays a role in food safety; and what steps they can take to keep food safe from the time it is purchased until it is consumed. The website is located on the Internet at www.foodsafety.gov and can be reached by clicking on Consumer Education.

A joint FDA-USDA video and companion publication targeted specifically to seniors was undertaken in FY 99. The video follows three sets of seniors as they learn about safe food handling. Printed information reinforces the four major points of safe food handling — clean, cook, chill and separate--don't cross-contaminate. Distribution of the video and publication will be completed in FY 2000.

Consumer behavior research indicates that many people are unaware of the dangers posed by eating raw or undercooked eggs. A specialized egg safety campaign was developed in an effort to reduce the incidence of foodborne illnesses caused by Salmonella Enteritidis. "The campaign kick-off was tied to FDA's proposed egg labeling and refrigeration rule. This provided an opportunity to inform consumers about safe handling and cooking of eggs," said Davidson. A video news release was developed and used by television stations with a rated viewership of more than 2 million persons. Two easily reproduced fact sheets were developed — Playing It Safe With Eggs for consumers and Assuring the Safety of Eggs for food service personnel. These fact sheets are on FDA's website and were mailed to institutions and organizations serving populations most vulnerable to foodborne disease such as day care centers, nursing homes, and area agencies on aging for redistribution to senior centers, congregate feeding programs, health care professional organizations, and to media. A news article was written in English and Spanish and distributed to small dailies, weeklies and local advertiser-type publications.

"Cook It Safely" was the theme of FY 99's National Food Safety Education Month (NFSEM), an annual event to promote food safety to consumers and the food service industry. The President's Food Safety Initiative recognizes and encourages observance of this event, which was created by the International Food Safety Council. Special mailings were sent to over 100,000 food service directors for at-risk audiences—school food service directors and day care and nursing home food service directors—with special information about food safety.

FDA, in conjunction with USDA, developed and mailed an NFSEM consumer education planning guide to public health departments, FDA public affairs specialists and USDA extension agents, school nurses and school food service directors throughout the country. The 43-page guide contained reproducible activities and publicity ideas for food safety education during September. FDA public affairs specialists planned special programs in their communities during the month.

"One of the best ways to develop safe food handlers is to educate students," said Laura Fox, an education specialist in FSI. In FY 99, work began on a supplementary food science curriculum aimed at middle and high school students. Through this program students will learn that foodborne illness may be caused by harmful bacteria that gets into the food supply anywhere in the continuum from farm-to-table. Students will also learn to prevent foodborne illness from occurring at home through proper food handling. Cosponsoring this program is the National Science Teachers Association. Components of the program will include an interactive website, a videotape, and printed teacher and student resource and activity guides. The program's content will meet the National Science Standards for Education.

FDA's support of the Partnership for Food Safety Education resulted in a further expansion of the Fight BAC!™ message to the public. In FY 99, the Partnership released a supplementary curriculum program for students in grades 4-6 to teach the four basic safe food handling messages through video and classroom activities and experiments.

"The influence of the Partnership is demonstrated by the number of other organizations who are coming to the Partnership with ideas for developing new initiatives," said Davidson. In FY 99, the Partnership joined forces with two major organizations—Pfizer and McDonald's—to provide food safety information to millions of consumers. Pfizer reprinted the Partnership's consumer brochure and made copies available to the public at its "Microbes" traveling science exhibit. McDonald's began its parent brochure "Playing it Safe at Home" with a section on food safety using Fight BAC!™ to deliver the four basic safe food handling messages. McDonald's printed 12 million copies for distribution in September and October 1999.

In FY 99, FDA public affairs specialists received funds from FSI to create 21 grassroots food safety education projects. Many of the projects utilize the Fight BAC!™ campaign materials, support National Food Safety Education Month, or focus on populations at severe risk from foodborne illness; people of low literacy; or multicultural populations. Howard Seltzer, education advisor on the FSI staff coordinates the funding of these grassroots projects. "An important aspect of the education program is getting materials to the people who need them in languages and approaches that are culturally appropriate. The FDA public affairs specialists understand the needs of consumers in the communities they serve," he said.

"The FDA has continuously led the way in getting an effective food safety message out to the public. The Outreach and Information Center (O&IC) is an important, new resource that will help put the most up-to-date, reliable food safety information at the fingertips of those who need it most — American consumers," said Secretary of Health and Human Services Donna E. Shalala in announcing the opening of FDA's new Center.

Open for business on Sept. 14, 1999, the O&IC was created in part to enhance FDA's ability to provide accurate and meaningful information to the public about food safety. It is funded as one of the targeted projects for development under the Food Safety Initiative. The O&IC operates a newly expanded tollfree public information line 1-888-SAFEFOOD. The system includes more than 200 hours of newly recorded information. Between the hours of 10:00 a.m. and 4:00 p.m., EST, information specialists respond to calls directly from the public.