“It is one thing to respond to a disaster – quite another to anticipate, prepare for and prevent its occurrence,” contends Dr. Adesoji Adelaja, newly selected Executive Dean of Cook College and the New Jersey Agriculture Experiment Station, (NJAES), Rutgers. “Our past history with alar on apples, contaminated strawberries from Chile and e coli in hamburger meat pinpointed our vulnerability. We are little more prepared today for accidental introduction of foodborne pathogens or chemicals. Faced with intentional tampering, our system would fail.”
Adelaja today announced an effort to shore up these weaknesses in New Jersey and build a model of private-government-academic cooperation that other states might follow. “New Jersey is a leading food distribution hub for the Northeast,” stated Dr. Richard Merritt, director of the Food Systems Professional Education Initiative for the Mid-Atlantic Consortium, funded by the W.K. Kellogg Foundation and 10 colleges and universities (MAC). “New Jersey plays a key role in the region’s $277 billion food industry, where a high concentration of national and international food companies make their headquarters. It is natural for Rutgers’ agricultural and natural resources college and its network of experiment stations to take leadership in this issue.”
Adelaja said that the Food & Agriculture Biosecurity Initiative would have several central themes. First it would assess vulnerability of and determine priority early warning surveillance points for the food supply from farm to table. It would create a warehouse of current science and gaps in knowledge on plant and animal disease agents, potential foodborne pathogens, recombinant infectious agents and vaccines. It would work with government and industry to establish standards and best practices for prevention and rapid communication systems for identification and warning of food system threats.
Cook/NJAES is collaborating with the Rutgers Food Policy Institute, The Environmental and Occupational Health Sciences Institute (EOHSI), The University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey (UMDNJ), the W. K. Kellogg Foundation’s Mid-Atlantic Consortium, and other units within Rutgers and other colleges and universities in efforts to mount preemptive and responsive strategies for food system terrorism. “Class A pathogens are not limited to human disease agents like smallpox or anthrax. Our food system is just as vulnerable to biological warfare,” said Dr. Drew Harris of UMDNJ.
This initiative, being administered through the Food Policy Institute, follows the recommendations of the February 2002 workshop on this topic sponsored by Cook College/NJAES, UMDNJ and the MAC.
The Food & Agriculture Biosecurity Initiative will be headed by Dr. Audrey Cross, J.D. Cross, who has both a doctoral degree in nutrition and is a lawyer, has extensive experience in local, state and federal government nutrition programs. She served as counsel to the California State Senate and as Coordinator for Human Nutrition at USDA under President Carter.