PLEASANTON, CA -- Steve Burnham, the new vice president of produce for Safeway Inc., joked that he was happy to leave the meat department where E. coli and Salmonella scares often reared their ugly heads.

Speaking to more than 200 attendees at the Sept. 16 luncheon of the Fresh Produce & Floral Council, here, the longtime Safeway executive also quipped that he was glad his days of dealing with country-of-origin labeling in the seafood department were over.

The humor was not lost on the crowd that knows the food-safety issue is probably the industry's biggest concern today, followed by the country-of- origin labeling law, which goes into full force at the retail produce level at the end of the month.

On a serious note, Mr. Burnham admitted that he was new to produce but said that many of the same issues that he dealt with in meat, where he has spent the majority of his career, are present in the produce department. Both departments are fast-paced with perishability being the obvious factor that connects the two most important departments at any grocery store.

The food-safety theme was continued by keynote speaker Robert Whitaker, chief science officer for the Produce Marketing Association, who said that while food safety has not been a driver in the produce industry until now, that is changing and must change as the industry moves forward. He said that the 2006 E. coli outbreak associated with spinach changed the game forever - within both the industry and the government.

In the aftermath of the crisis, virtually every company has to deal with a heightened awareness by the media, consumers and the government. The Food & Drug Administration has gone from a reactive position to a proactive one on this issue, he said. Regulations are in the works and he said that national food-safety legislation would almost certainly come regardless of who wins the November presidential election.

Dr. Whitaker urged all companies to take a top-down approach to creating their own comprehensive food-safety program. He said that for a program to be successful, it can't be an afterthought but must become part of the firm's culture, with buy-in at all levels including senior management. He urged every company to do its own risk assessment "because nobody knows your company better than you do." He added, "You know where your risks are."

The PMA executive said that there are four attributers to a successful food- safety program: responsibility, knowledge, communication and continuous improvement.

Fleshing those concepts out, he said that responsibility involves every level of the company taking ownership of the product that is produced; knowledge includes providing adequate training so that everyone is aware of the risks and the technical expertise to mitigate those risks; communicating your plan and actions both internally and externally must be part of your program; and continuous improvement and reassessment are very important as the situation changes on an ongoing basis.

Commenting on the industry's preoccupation with audits, he said that an audit only reflects a snapshot of what is happening at any particular time. It may provide some comfort, he said, but it has very little to do with creating a successful food-safety program.

He likened audits to knowing the answers to a test before it is given, and he said that while flunking an audit is an indication that a company has major problems, passing an audit is not a guarantee that everything is how it should be.

In fact, he said, audits are often a detraction from the real food-safety program that must be developed and customized for every operation.