Tracing produce helps answer outbreak questions – Chipotle edition

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When I was a graduate student investigating food safety in the produce industry, I saw a lot of transactions and product movement while I was in packing sheds. Repacking, trading pallets (“I’m short on product but I need to fill an order”) and cash sales. These transactions are messy, documentation and separation-wise, and provide a challenge to traceability within the supply chain.

Traceability and being able to follow the route that a a supply is part of a good food safety culture. When it works, it allows investigators to find the source of a problem leading to lessons learned.Chipotle

According to WRAL, some folks I know in the North Carolina food safety world are helping out trace produce ingredients identified as the source of 40 cases of E. coli O26 linked to Chipotle restaurants.

When the E. coli outbreak occurred at Chipotle restaurants in the Northwest, tracing the source of the problem started at Food Logiq, a software food safety company in Durham. Food Logiq contracts with companies like restaurants and grocery stores to track fresh fruits, vegetables and other products from the source to where they end up. If there’s a problem—as in the case of Chipolte—Food Logiq’s software can trace it.

“The big thing that we do is proactive data collection,” said Andrew Kennedy, co-founder of Food Logiq. 

“This case label, not only does it have the product, but it has the log code which then points to packaging dates,” Kennedy said. “We know exactly what dates it was packed. We can trace that back to the farm of origin, and that is the key piece of information.”

Ben Chapman, a food safety expert and associate professor at North Carolina State, blogs about food safety issues. He says companies like Food Logiq track vital information about the food supply chain. “The more we can trace these things, and pull that information together, that means we can all build—in our community and food safety community—better tools to help reduce the chances of people getting sick,” Chapman said.
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About Ben Chapman

Dr. Ben Chapman is a professor and food safety extension specialist at North Carolina State University. As a teenager, a Saturday afternoon viewing of the classic cable movie, Outbreak, sparked his interest in pathogens and public health. With the goal of less foodborne illness, his group designs, implements, and evaluates food safety strategies, messages, and media from farm-to-fork. Through reality-based research, Chapman investigates behaviors and creates interventions aimed at amateur and professional food handlers, managers, and organizational decision-makers; the gate keepers of safe food. Ben co-hosts a biweekly podcast called Food Safety Talk and tries to further engage folks online through Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, YouTube and, maybe not surprisingly, Pinterest. Follow on Twitter @benjaminchapman.