Corporate Social Responsibility and Food Safety

When the US government is moving too slowly, it is good to see that some companies are acting responsibly and moving forward on food safety. Costco is one such company and it is requiring that its produce suppliers test all of the bagged produce sold at Costco. It is also testing all of its beef at its warehouses for E.Coli (all the strains that it can possibly test for).

This heightened awareness is coming from the food poisoning events, due to E. Coli contamination, that happened over the past few weeks in Europe, and that I have written about, which resulted in thousands of illnesses and dozens of deaths, primarily in Germany, attributed, in the latest analysis, to seeds that originated in northern Africa (and not sprouts, as originally thought).

What is also making such testing now feasible by food companies, is that test kits are now being manufactured and made available that can test for many of the known E.Coli strains. DuPont is one company making such test kits -- thanks!

Corporations need to realize that safety and the quality of their products should be paramount because once a reputation is lost, it is extremely difficult to recover it. Also, the products may be consumed by those you know well and love.