Small Minnesota company creates national food safety Web portal

Here is another example of our unofficial motto — where there is a need, there is a business opportunity. Just think food safety. This is what Eric Hoffman did, and he instructed the computer development team in his company, Stillwater, Minnestoa-based EJH & Associates to create an initiative to protect the nation’s food supply. Working with DHS and other federal agencies, EJH & Associates have created FoodShield.org, a Web site used to alert various federal regulatory bodies and scientific communities about any dangers related to food. “Some days it’s a little surreal,” Hoffman said of working on the project. “We realize it’s a unique opportunity.”

In the event of a food-borne outbreak, agencies from several states can use the site instantly to compare information and determine how to address the problem. The idea may seem simple, but such an initiative had never been previously created. For instance, last month North Carolina recalled canned food products from Castleberry Food which was posted on the FoodShield site. From the site, federal and state health professionals could compare and share information with each other. Before the Web site was created, however, agencies located in different states had no easy way to communicate. Creating such transparency between different bodies of government posed a tough challenge, Hoffman said. “It’s been like herding cats to get some of those political agencies that were not sharing info to start doing so,” he said.

When the company started compiling information, they were working with a five-year-old list from different laboratories, which were obviously outdated, EJH & Associates partner Dave Neuman said. The National Food Safety System originally sought to create a Web-based directory that could connect farmers and laboratories during times when food contamination outbreaks occurred. Out of that came FoodShield, which hopes to connect state agencies with federal health agencies in the event of Hurricane Katrina-like disasters or terrorist attacks, Hoffman said. “Terrorism doesn’t just happen with bombs,” Hoffman said. “It can happen with bugs - it can happen with the stuff we all eat day to day.” In creating that database, Hoffman said the company set out to create a user-friendly site that could be used easily and efficiently. “It was more of a, ‘How do you need to do it, and we’ll do it that way,’” Hoffman said.

There is an interesting business-angle story here, too. EJH & Associates was created in 2003 and four years later it is still a five-person operation. Hoffman said they plan to double that number in the coming weeks. Having a smaller company work on a national initiative proves that the biggest business may not always be the best fit, he said. “I think it proves that it’s worth taking a good look at smaller firms — many of them have very bright people,” Hoffman said.