68 69Global Identification - September 2008 www.global-identification.com68 69Global Identification - September 2008 www.global-identification.com

by Prof. David C. Wyld, Southeastern

Louisiana University

raspberries and Salmonella in cantaloupe and tomatoes.

The title of this article was also the title of a 1978 movie, that later became a cult classic. During a recent salmonella outbreak in the United States, variations on the “killer tomato” title were incorporated into the head-lines of a number of articles in major news outlets, as well as in many blog posts.

The first case of this most recent salmonella outbreak was reported in New Mexico on April 23. By mid-July, over one thousand cases of ‘Saint Paul’ salmonella had been reported across 42 states and the District of Colum-bia, with more also reported in Canada and Mexico (the two largest export markets for U.S. tomato produc-ers). The suspicion was that these foreign cases could be

FOOD

We all know that there are many health benefits to be

gained by eating more fruits and vegetables. However, in recent years there have been an increasing number of food-borne disease out-breaks involving fresh pro-duce, including: Hepatitis A in green onions, E. coli in spinach and lettuce, Shigel-la in parsley, Cyclospora in

In an increasingly globalized food supply chain, RFID can prove invaluable not only

in tracing the source of disease outbreaks but also in ensuring the freshest and

healthiest produce reaches the end consumer

Attack of the Killer Tomatoes?

68 69Global Identification - September 2008 www.global-identification.com

68 69Global Identification - September 2008 www.global-identification.com68 69Global Identification - September 2008 www.global-identification.com

traced to the same point of origin as the thousand-plus cases in the United States. However, today the ques-tion still remains as to what that origin exactly was. While fresh tomatoes were first identified as the culprit in this outbreak, federal health officials are now less and less certain that this is the case. In mid-July, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Preven-tion (CDC) expanded its in-quiry into a number of fresh produce items, including jalapeño and Serrano pep-pers, which could yet prove to be the actual source of the outbreak. Howard Selt-zer, the national education advisor for the U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s (FDA) Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition, recently commented that it was highly unlikely that a “smok-ing gun” would be found to definitively trace the source of the outbreak. Ian Williams, who heads the CDC’s Out-break Net Team, meanwhile remarked that: “People are very used to the sort of ‘CSI’ thing where you put it into a computer and out comes the answer. In reality, some-times we don’t figure things out.”

While the epidemiologists search for answers, the eco-nomic toll of the current salmonella outbreak on the tomato industry is unmistak-able. Kathy Means, Vice Pres-ident of the Produce Market-ing Association, commented that the impact of the most recent salmonella scare has been that “an entire indus-try has come to a standstill

and consumers are affected by the publicity.” The losses for tomato farmers, proces-sors, transporters and food producers during the crisis amounted to tens of millions of dollars a day, and some companies may not survive the impact of the outbreak.

Indeed, as we have seen with prior outbreaks linked to spe-cific food items and brand names, such as recent E. coli outbreaks involving bagged spinach or scallions used by Taco Bell, sales volume and brand images can be very slow to rebound in the face of consumer fears and last-ing media images.

George Manolis, Senior Vice President of Operations for IES, a New Jersey-based sup-ply chain software vendor, recently wrote in which he observed that: “Agricultural supply chains are notori-ously complex. Produce trav-els from the grower, to the processor, to the distributor, to the retailer or restaurant or even on to more com-plex supermarket distribu-tion before it finally reaches your table.” He went on to propose that: “With all of the complexities inherent in the agricultural supply chain, the industry is ripe for the application of RFID technol-ogy.” Thus, it is important to look at the prospects for RFID in the fresh produce

cold chain, and in particular, the unfortunate specialty of the day - tomatoes. We have already seen pilot schemes in Australia and The Nether-lands to test the viability of tracking tomato shipments. Both involved the incorpora-tion of temperature sensing

capabilities to track ship-ments in the produce cold chain to protect against the development of salmonella bacteria and identify suspect shipments. Today, the state of Hawaii is undertaking a significant RFID pilot, aimed at protecting both public health and the health of both its produce farmers, distribu-tors and retailers.

Tomatoes and salmonella

Your mother told you to eat your fruits and veggies.

Attack of the Killer Tomatoes?

68 69Global Identification - September 2008 www.global-identification.com

RFID seems well suited to the aim of building safety into supply chain processes in the tomato industry

There are approximately 1.4 million cases of salmonella infections reported annually in the United States, with 95% of these believed to be food-borne. The symptoms of salmonella include fever, abdominal pain, diarrhea, and vomiting, and they appear in most patients within 72 hours of infection. Severe cases of salmonella occur mostly among infants and the elderly, along with those who suffer from immune deficiencies. In these cases, when the infection spreads beyond the intestines and permeates the body through the bloodstream, the results can be fatal. In such severe cases, antibiotic treatment can be highly effective, if the patient is diagnosed early enough.

Salmonella facts

70 Global Identification - September 2008

market in the United States, divided between two categories: fresh-market and processing tomatoes. Fresh-market tomatoes are hand-picked to preserve their pristine

condition, while processing tomatoes are machine-har-vested and used in a variety of products, from tomato sauces and juices to salsa and ketchup. Over time, tomato varieties have been bred specifically to serve the re-quirements of both markets. For example the processing variety contains up to ten percent more solid content to make it more usable as a base ingredient. Prices for fresh-market tomatoes also tend to be higher and more variable due to higher labor costs and greater market un-certainty. Most processing tomatoes are produced un-der contract between grow-ers and tomato processors, and tomatoes are grown in all 50 states by recreational growers.

However, due to climate and land conditions, com-mercial-scale growing oc-curs only in 20 states. Cali-fornia is by far the largest producer of tomatoes, ac-counting for almost a third of all fresh-market tomatoes and over 95% of processing tomatoes. California is the largest grower of process-ing tomatoes in the world and the United States is a net exporter of tomatoes and tomato-products, with approximately 6-7% of both the U.S fresh-market and processing tomato crops currently being exported.

Americans consume, on average, over 30 pounds of tomatoes and tomato products annually, making it the country’s second most consumed fruit/vegetable. Over a quarter of all Ameri-cans report consuming fresh-market tomatoes on a daily basis, and their sales are almost evenly divided between the food service and consumer markets. Yet over 70% of fresh-market to-matoes are consumed in the home. According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Economic Research Service, fresh-market tomato con-sumption has been on the rise amongst Americans due to the increasing variety of tomatoes on the market as well as an array of green-house and hydroponic to-matoes. The fresh-market varieties also benefit from what it terms the “endur-ing popularity” of salads and sandwiches in the American diet. For its part, processing tomato consumption has also risen steadily amongst Americans with the grow-ing popularity of pizza, pasta and salsa.

Tomatoes are particularly sus-ceptible to salmonella bacte-ria because of their high wa-ter content, which can serve as a breeding ground if bac-teria-laden water penetrates the soft skin of the tomato. Tomatoes can become con-taminated at any point in the supply chain when exposed to tainted water, especially if placed in water that is far cooler or warmer than the ambient temperature, as this softens their skin.

Food

When it came to toma-toes, one might well think that you are covering both, as people often wonder whether the tomato, in its many varieties, is a fruit or a vegetable. In fact, from a botanical standpoint, it is a fruit, but from a horticultural standpoint, it is a vegetable. Regardless, tomatoes do have tremendous health benefits. They are the most nutrient-rich fruit or veg-etable, with high concentra-tions of Vitamins A and C, among others. Consumption of tomatoes has been linked to lowered risk of a variety of conditions including cancer, heart disease, degenerative eye diseases, osteoporosis, asthma and diabetes.

According to figures from the United Fresh Produce Association, tomato farm-ing is at least a $1.4 billion

Processing tomato product

consumption in the United

States.

Source Data: Economic

Research Service, U.S.

Department of Agriculture,

April 2008

71www.global-identification.com

Over the past decade, almost two thousand cases of food poisoning have been attrib-uted to tomatoes in over a dozen food-borne outbreaks. In response, the FDA initiated the Tomato Safety Initiative (TSI), specifically designed to reduce the occurrence of tomato-related illnesses. The TSI is a joint effort between the FDA and the state health and agriculture depart-ments in Virginia and Florida ‒ where the majority of to-mato-related outbreaks have originated. The TSI examines tomato growers and proces-sors’ best practices aimed at reducing the possible pres-ence of salmonella.

Both the Consumer Federa-tion of America (CFA) and the Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI) have petitioned the FDA to enact emergency regulations to re-quire rapid traceback capa-bilities in the fresh produce market. The FDA is currently pushing for the authority to mandate safe handling rules ‒ what the agency terms “preventative controls” ‒ for the tomato industry. On the first of July, Florida became the first state to enforce “to-mato best practices” for to-mato growing and handling through its Department of Agriculture. Due to budget cuts, the agency’s on-site inspections of food-process-ing facilities have actually declined by over fifty per-cent over the past five years. According to Dr. David Ache-son, the FDA’s food safety chief, while the agency is seeking to step-up inspec-tions: “The critical point is to

build safety upfront, not load up inspections at the end.” Thus, with its capability to provide cold chain tempera-ture monitoring and track-and-trace capabilities, RFID seems well suited to this aim

of building safety into supply chain processes in the toma-to industry.

The Hawaiian RFID pilot

In 2007, four tourists and four Hawaiian residents were sick-ened in an E. coli outbreak. After months of investiga-tion, Hawaiian officials pin-pointed the cause to lettuce from a farm in Kauai, where the fields had been contami-nated by storm water from a nearby cattle pasture.

Partly in response to such public health concerns, and partly to protect its standing in the U.S. and world agri-cultural markets, Hawaii has embarked on the first state-government-led food trace-ability project. The Hawaii State Department of Agricul-ture, working with the Ha-waii Farm Bureau Federation, initiated the planned three-year RFID pilot in November 2007, looking at tracking a variety of fresh produce, in-cluding not just tomatoes, but also watermelons, straw-berries, and onions. Officially named the “Farm to Fork” project, the program seeks

to do exactly that ‒ tracking cases and pallets of fresh-market tomatoes from the time they are picked in the field through to processing and delivery to stores and restaurants. The pilot initially

involves just four farms rang-ing in size from a small family farm on Hawaii’s Big Island to a large, 2,000-acre op-eration on Oahu. And now, there already is a list of farms wishing to participate as the program expands. In the pi-lot, the state is providing the RFID labels and handheld readers, working in conjunc-tion with technology part-ners including GlobeRanger, Lowry Computer Products, Motorola and Weyerhaeuser. The University of Hawaii is also working on the project, looking to develop biosen-sors to directly test produce for the presence of danger-ous bacteria.

The Hawaiian RFID project involves leading downline participants in the fresh-market produce cold chain, including the state’s largest wholesale produce distribu-tor, Honolulu-based Arm-strong Produce, and the 29-store Foodland grocery store chain. Already, the system is demonstrating the ben-efit of tracking inventory of these bulk produce items more accurately at the ware-house and store level, reduc-

The Hawaii RFID pilot envisions a day when a cook can scan RFID tags and know how fresh the produce is

72 Global Identification - September 2008

ing spoilage and improving the quality of produce at the point of sale by provid-ing a more complete record of transit and storage time, both in refrigerated and am-bient air conditions. The pilot will even test RFID at the res-taurant level, envisioning a day when a cook in a restau-rant can scan such tags and is able to review actual data regarding the warm and cold zones through which the produce has traveled. This way he would be able to know how fresh the produce is rather than relying on its looks and apparent condi-tions. John Ryan, the chief admin-istrator for the Hawaii pro-gram, has proclaimed that:

Food

“Our goal here is to develop a model that can hope-fully be used by many other states.” The agency feels that once the price point falls sig-nificantly enough, RFID will be adopted by many of the 5,000 farms in the Hawaiian Islands ‒ the vast majority of which are small in acreage and still family-owned. The agency also believes that as reader technology migrates into cell phones, RFID will be made even more accessible to small farmers and opera-tors.

The Hawaiian RFID pilot has even garnered an award from this year’s Computer-world Honors Program. The Department of Agriculture envisions rapid expansion of the project as the price of RFID declines, making it more feasible for smaller farms and producers to implement the technology. As part of its outreach and educational ef-forts to promote RFID usage, the department is commit-ted to establishing an RFID lab in Hawaii, accessible to both the business and gov-ernment community. The RFID pilot is expected to cost the state $1.6 mil-

lion. It has already received over half a million dollars in grant funding and is cur-rently seeking over a million dollars in additional funding. Alan Takemoto, who serves as the Executive Director of the Hawaii Farm Bureau, re-cently commented that the project will help determine if RFID proves economically feasible for farmers. He be-lieves that its use will also add value to Hawaiian pro-duce and protect its viability in the face of disease threats such as the recent salmonel-la outbreak. Sandra Lee Kuni-moto, who chairs the Hawaii Board of Agriculture, re-cently commented that with the food supply chain being increasingly globalized, it is becoming more and more important to have the ca-pability to determine where food comes from and where it has been distributed. The agency believes that when RFID track and trace capabili-ties are fully operational, if an outbreak such as the recent salmonella incident were to occur, agricultural officials would be able to isolate and recall suspect boxes of pro-duce in approximately an hour.

Analysis

Given the circumstances of the most recent salmo-nella outbreak in the United States, the fresh produce market is indeed ‒ no pun intended ‒ ripe for RFID. Writing in Information Week, Mary Hayes Weier recently commented that: “We’ve got the technologies available to

Public health concerns and

commercial standing proved

high motivations for Hawaii

to implement an RFID

food-tracking pilot

Tomatoes are particularly

vulnerable to Salmonella

because of their high water

content

73www.global-identification.com

know where our bulk food comes from, but apparently not enough incentive to fig-ure out how to implement tech in a way that makes sense and gets buy-in from the supply chain.”

The state of Hawaii should be applauded for its innovative leadership amongst its agri-cultural officials, along with the cooperation of growers, distributors, and retailers who are making its pilot a significant test for RFID in the fresh market supply chain. As tomatoes have been histori-cally plagued by salmonella problems, the application of RFID in the fresh-market to-mato supply chain deserves even more pilots and studies on the U.S. mainland. How-ever, attention should be directed across the fruit and vegetable supply chain, es-pecially toward other items that have been associated with bacterial disease out-breaks, such as bagged spin-ach, carrots, and onions. In this instance, the econom-ic issues may be even more important than the techno-logical ones. Ultimately, with the costs involved, RFID may prove too much for small farmers to invest in alone, as they have a small profit margin to begin with, es-pecially in the face of rising operational costs, including diesel, fertilizers, pesticides, insurance and labor. If there are state and/or federal man-dates, this will be a moot point. However, the ability of government agencies ‒ and RFID technology providers ‒ to help defray and/or sub-

sidize the cost of implement-ing RFID will help push the use of the technology across the agricultural sector.

Furthermore, if farmers and distributors can see real benefits from the traceabil-ity of products from farm to fork, then there will certainly be greater buy-in from the farming community. These

benefits include improved business and operational in-telligence and the ability to better pinpoint products for recall in the event of contam-ination. They will also benefit by gaining the ability to de-liver fresh cut vegetables of improved quality and with longer shelf life to consum-ers and commercial buyers. This will prove beneficial to an entire state or region (as Hawaii has found through its quality branding effort), both in terms of protecting their markets and enhancing their market image.

Hawaii’s John Ryan recently observed: “It is time for ag-riculture to move into the 21st century and start using tools and technologies that really help us achieve higher quality and food safety stan-dards, well beyond what government inspections and audits are capable off. Our RFID-based traceability pilot is a giant leap in the right direction.” Overall, the entire fresh produce market will

need to look at RFID, making the entire distribution sys-tem ‒ from the farm to the end consumer ‒ an exciting prospect for RFID technol-ogy vendors. The produce industry can benefit greatly from having both real-time business intelligence and the ability to prevent and control bacterial disease outbreaks ‒ and mitigate the impact

on public health and on the industry by having better isolation and recall capabili-ties. Having such a system in place will bring ROI for the participants in the fresh-mar-ket supply chain, bolstering consumer confidence that the tomato ‒ or any other fruit or vegetable ‒ they are holding not only looks good, but will provide all the health benefits, without the risks, of consuming raw fruits and vegetables.

Pilots for the use of RFID in

the fresh market produce

cold chain are proving the

possibilities offered by

the technology

As reader technology migrates into cell phones, RFID will become even more accessible to small farmers