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T00-55                          Print Media:        301-827-6242 
October 16, 2000                
                                Consumer Inquiries: 888-INFO-FDA

FDA ANNOUNCES FOOD SAFETY GRANTS

The Food and Drug Administration announced today that it is awarding grants for innovative food safety projects to thirteen state and local regulatory agencies. This grant program is intended to complement, develop or improve state and local food safety programs that may also be used or transferred to other state or local jurisdictions. These grants, which total more than $530,000, were awarded during National Food Safety Education Month as part of President Clinton's Food Safety Initiative.

The grants are for a one-year period and were awarded in two key areas: inspection techniques and education/health information dissemination.

The grants awarded and the grantees are:

  1. Cerro Gordo County (IA) Department of Public Health "North Central Iowa Innovative Food Safety Program" -- designed to enhance food service establishment compliance with regulations and to reduce the risk factors that contribute to foodborne illness by at least 25%.
  2. Delaware Health & Social Services "Innovative Inspection Methodologies"-- develops an inspection method using a traceback technique.
  3. Du Page County (IL) Health Department "Quality Assurance Partnership with Chain Operations"-- establishes working partnerships with three or more food service chains in Du Page County in order to increase compliance and reduce the critical violations of the food safety regulations.
  4. Edgar County (IL) Health Department "Supplemental Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Point (HACCP) Exercises"-- creates a partnership between the Edgar County Health Department and Class 1 eating establishments to provide food safety demonstrations to the community.
  5. Effingham County (IL) Health Department "Food Handler's Card"-- offers an educational program for teenagers, between the ages of 15 and 18, who may enter the work force by way of food establishments and will have had little education in regard to proper food handling procedures.
  6. Florida Department of Business and Professional Regulation "Science-Based Inspection/Educational Program on the Causes and Prevention of Foodborne Illnesses through Process HACCP"-- develops baseline food safety educational materials and methods to concentrate on foodborne illness risk factors that are targeted to the average food service employee.
  7. Jefferson County (MO) Health Center "Study of Baseline Microbiological Contaminate Levels"-- establishes statewide microbiological contaminant level baselines for food service and retail food facilities using ATP/enzyme bioluminescence and rapid pathogen testing.
  8. Kansas Department of Agriculture "Bilingual Educational Materials to Protect Public Health in a Changing Kansas"-- updates the existing state written and videotaped educational materials for milk haulers.
  9. Olmsted County (MN) Public Health Services "Scheduling Inspections as a Means to Improve Risk Factor Evaluation and Develop Active Managerial Control Criteria"-- defines and develops a process of assuring active managerial control by developing criteria upon which to base scheduled inspections.
  10. Tazewell County (IL) Health Department "Internal & External Audits of Tazewell County Health Department's Modified HACCP Program"-- designed to demonstrate that a modified HACCP program for high risk facilities will reduce the risk factors that cause foodborne illness.
  11. Town of Stratford (CT) Health Department "Reducing Risk Factors for Foodborne Illness: A Local Level Food Safety Educational Intervention"-- designed to instill a more universal comprehension of critical food sanitation practices in all licensed food retail venues by reaching deeper into the ranks of food service personnel with educational interventions.
  12. Tri-County (CO) Health Department "Food Safety Education in Asian Food Establishments"--addresses the problem of improving food safety handling practices in approximately 180 Asian food establishments in the Tri-county area.
  13. Village of Oak Park (IL) "Food Safety Education for Food Service Workers for Whom English is a Second Language"-- develops a food safety education program for food service workers for whom English is a second language, as an intervention strategy to reduce the factors that cause foodborne illness.

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