New Hampshire firms fight bioterrorism

Food and Drug Administration suspects a certain food is contaminated, it can follow the food back to its source. Food companies are required to make records available to the administration within 24 hours of a records request, and to keep the records for up to two years.

The Bioterrorism Act has a broad scope — all domestic companies that manufacture, process, pack, transport, distribute, receive or hold food are required to keep the records. Foreign companies that transport food in the United States are also included.

There are some exemptions, such as farms, restaurants, and food companies who are regulated by the U.S. Department of Agriculture (which covers meat, poultry and eggs).

The Bioterrorism Act was a “very carefully negotiated piece of legislation,” Eisen said. For good reason, too: the law was a major change to the Food and Drug Administration’s enforcement authorities.

If companies do not comply with the record-keeping requirements, they could face civil or criminal penalties.

Eisen said his group was supportive of the Bioterrorism Act. When food is contaminated, “distributors are committed to contacting their customers and getting that product line out of the stream,” he said.

United Natural Foods, which has a distribution center in West Chesterfield, has a “pretty elaborate plan,” when it comes to food security, said Thomas Dziki, the company’s vice president of sustainable development. The company is a leading national distributor of natural, organic and specialty foods. It distributes to the United States and 40 countries worldwide. Net income in the company’s 2009 fiscal year was $59.2 million.

Keene-based C&S did not return requests for comment about the company’s food-security measures. Every United Natural Foods facility in the country — the company has about a dozen spread throughout America — has to be registered with the Food and Drug Administration. The company already tracked the origins and destinations of each food shipment in case of a recall, Dziki said.

So when the Bioterrorism Act was passed, United Natural Foods just “strengthened the requirements that we already had in place,” he said. The company did not have to hire new employees, but the people it has have needed more intensive training — including presentations on food defense, food safety orientations and online Food and Drug Administration training for managers. There are also quarterly “refresher” sections for employees, Dziki said, to ensure people are updated on current food safety rules and know the signs of contaminated food.

Dziki did not know what percentage of the company’s expenses go to food security, but he said it certainly didn’t rise to the level of employee costs.

The regular food-safety training takes time, and United Natural Foods also pays an outside company to audit its food safety procedures annually. When it comes to food safety, he said, “I don’t think you can have too much of an expense.”