Center of Excellence at the Southern Ag Center Partners on $500,000 USDA Grant to Improve Food Safety Training
Baton Rouge, La. - The Center of Excellence for Nutrition, Health, Wellness, and Quality of Life (COE) at the Southern University Ag Center is part of a collaborative effort recently awarded nearly $500,000 in funding from the U.S. Department of Agriculture National Institute of Food and Agriculture’s (USDA-NIFA) Food Safety Outreach Program (FSOP). The Southern University Ag Center received $70,000 of this funding to play a key role in outreach and training delivery.
The initiative, which involves the LSU AgCenter, Southern University Ag Center, and Florida A&M University, aims to provide enhanced food safety training for farm workers and underserved farmers. It focuses on innovative and interactive learning techniques.
This joint project, titled "On-Farm Food Safety Training for Farm Workers and Underserved Farmers Covering FSMA PSR and GAPs Requirements," moves away from traditional slideshow-based methods, adopting hands-on activities, posters, and flipcharts to deliver short, on-farm lessons. These cover topics like Good Agricultural Practices (GAPs), worker health and hygiene, sanitation, risk assessment, and compliance with the Food Safety Modernization Act (FSMA) Produce Safety Rule (PSR).
The program provides a range of resources, including risk assessment tools, standard operating procedure templates, fact sheets, and recordkeeping logs. These tools help growers identify potential food safety hazards, evaluate current practices, and strengthen areas that need improvement. Onsite audits will also be conducted to support the implementation of robust food safety practices.
Achyut Adhikari, an LSU AgCenter food safety specialist and principal investigator for the grant, emphasized the project's transformative impact. “This grant allows us to bridge critical knowledge gaps among farmworkers and underserved farmers, equipping them with the tools and resources needed to meet regulatory and market-driven food safety requirements and ensure the integrity of our food system,” he said.
The project also supports bilingual training to accommodate the number of Spanish-speaking farmers and farmworkers in Louisiana and Florida. This inclusivity ensures broader access to the training and resources needed to strengthen food safety practices across diverse farming communities.
Additionally, the program bolsters the food safety capacity of two minority institutions, Southern University and Florida A&M, by leveraging the LSU AgCenter’s resources.
“This funding enables us to create a more inclusive and practical approach to food safety training, especially for growers who are often overlooked in conventional programs,” Adhikari added. “By providing hands-on training and tailored resources, we aim to enhance understanding of critical food safety practices, ensuring compliance with regulations and protecting public health.”
For more information about the project and upcoming training opportunities, contact Kiyana Kelly at kiyana_kelly@suagcenter.com or Brittany Howard at brittany_howard@suagcenter.com.
Information from the article, Research team awarded grant to better train farm workers on food safety, handling, written by V. Todd Miller, was used in the development of this press release.