On December 13 at Shamrock Foods in Commerce City, Colorado, PMA will bring its one-day food safety program to help small growers in the region explore the challenges of implementing a company food safety plan and culture, meeting buyer food safety requirements, and protecting their businesses’ and their bottom lines.

The meeting will also examine the basics of third-party food safety audits (insights into which are available via the Ask Dr. Bob audio blog) and crisis communication.

Speaking during this event are PMA’s food safety team of Dr. Bob Whitaker and Johnna Hepner; Markon Cooperative’s food safety director Mario Estrada; Colorado Department of Agriculture Commissioner John Salazar; a local chef/restaurateur; as well as other food safety experts.

To register for this event, visit the Colorado Department of Agriculture’s website. For more information on upcoming programs or to sponsor a small grower food safety event near you, contact Johnna Hepner.

Possibly driven by the popularity of cooking shows on television, it appears that while only 6 percent of Millennials say they have advanced skill in the kitchen (compared to 15 percent of those aged 55 and older), a quarter of Millennials claim to “love cooking” versus 17 percent of their senior counterparts, claims a new Mintel report.

It found the desire for a healthful diet is an important motivation for home cooking. Roughly half of home cooks said they cook because homemade food is generally healthier than both restaurant food and prepared foods sold at grocery stores. In addition to health, experimentation, socializing and personal enjoyment round out the reasons people are spending more time cooking.

Fifty-six percent of respondents who cook occasionally said cooking allows them to experiment and try new things and 27 percent said it helps them to explore foods eaten in other cultures. Other reasons cited include:

• Viewing cooking as a way to express affection to friends and family (48 percent)
• Finding enjoyment in the process of cooking (43 percent)
• Finding enjoyment in teaching their children how to cook (41 percent)
• Finding relaxation in preparing food (40 percent)

Mintel’s findings are interesting in light of PMA’s recent consumer study which found that 71 percent of consumers currently buy fresh, prepared pre-cooked meals at a supermarket, and that 36 percent of flexitarians (defined as those consumers who those trying to eat more meatless meals and are deliberately seeking to add more fresh fruits and vegetables to their diets) and 28 percent of non-flexitarians told us they were more likely to choose a pre-cooked meal at the supermarket if it contained fresh fruits and vegetables.

For more, check out Consumer Trends in Produce 2011 in the Consumer Research Center of the PMA website.

According to the November 25 edition of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, U.S. high school students still aren’t eating enough fruits and vegetables. In examining data from nearly 10,800 students in grades nine through 12 who took part in the National Youth Physical Activity and Nutrition Study 2010, CDC researchers found that median consumption was 1.2 times per day for both fruits and vegetables.

Overall, 28.5 percent of high school students consumed fruit less than once a day, and 33.2 percent of high school students consumed vegetables less than once a day. Just fewer than 17 percent of students said they consume fruit more than four times a day, and 11.2 percent of students said they consumed vegetables more than four times a day.

CDC stated that the infrequent fruit and vegetable consumption by high school students highlights the need for effective strategies to increase consumption and suggests that approaches such as farm-to-school initiatives, school gardens, salad bars in schools, and farmers’ markets (which seek to improve access to and availability of fruits and vegetables) may help to reverse this trend.

With regard to the salad bars program, PMA members who’d like to learn how to donate a salad bar to a school are encouraged to visit the online Salad Bars to Schools toolkit we developed, which provides step-by-step details on the donation process.

Last week, the U.S. Department of Agriculture announced it has awarded 10 grants to support 155 People’s Gardens in neighborhoods from Maryland to Hawaii. In a press statement, USDA said these sustainable community gardens will give residents direct access to fresh fruits and vegetables in underserved neighborhoods. A lack of access to fresh and nutritious food fuels obesity and domestic food insecurity—a condition where households experience limited or uncertain access to adequate food.

The grants announced totaled $725,000 and are the first awards given under the People’s Garden Grant Program. USDA received more than 360 proposals requesting more than $4 million. The program was designed to invest in urban and rural areas identified as food deserts or food insecure areas, particularly those with persistent poverty. Projects were funded in Alaska, Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Hawaii, Maryland, Michigan and Ohio.

The gardens are located at faith-based centers, on federal leased or owned property, at schools and other places within communities. All produce grown at a People’s Garden on USDA owned or leased property is donated to help those in need. To date, the People’s Garden has donated over 1 million pounds of produce to local food banks, food kitchens and other charitable organizations.

Reading about these community-based gardens reminded me of a comment made by a produce manager during a Fresh Summit session. He told the audience that his store has shifted its “locally grown” produce focus to that of “community grown.” This change has resonated with shoppers because they feel more closely connected to the food they buy.

This is also the time of year when a number of organizations seek donations to help those in need make it through the holiday seasons. You can find a People’s Garden in your area by checking out the People’s Gardens Interactive Map.

Last week I read about a Gallup poll which revealed that more than 20 percent of Americans said they did not have enough money to buy the food they or their families needed in October, closing in on the record-high 20.6 percent reported in November 2008 – adding to the growing evidence that more Americans are in economic distress. In addition, more than 13 million U.S. households received Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits in 2010, according to USDA.

The state with the highest food stamp/SNAP participation was Oregon with 17.9 percent while Tennessee and Michigan were among other states with the highest participation, while California, New Jersey and Wyoming were among the states with the lowest participation rates. Sixteen states had increases in food stamp/SNAP participation larger than the national average increase of 16.2 percent.

Here in Delaware, there were 77,138 Delawareans receiving SNAP benefits in July 2008; by August 2011 that number had grown to 139,878 (and we’re a small state!).

Yesterday I spent part of the day delivering food baskets for a local charity. I did this last year, and much like the 2010 deliveries, it was both a tiring and rewarding experience. One recipient told me that the basket “was a miracle” because he has a house full of kids to take care of and he didn’t know how he was going to have food for his Thanksgiving table.

This time of year in particular, we all see food drives for those in need. I can tell you these efforts take on a different meaning when you can connect the food to someone in need and see how the food basket makes a huge difference to them and their situations.

You’ll recall that last month, Fresh Summit exhibitors gave more than 316,000 pounds of fresh produce to the Atlanta Community Food Bank, as well as three other Feeding America food bank members in Georgia. That figure represents an almost 20 percent increase in the amount of fresh produce donated after Fresh Summit 2010. Our industry’s donation has become one of my favorite parts of Fresh Summit.

If you’d like to get involved with Feeding America and its produce program (or its hunger relief efforts in general), go to the Feeding America website to find a local food bank in your area to help make a miracle happen in your community.

According to a recently released study from Mintel, just more than half (57 percent) of respondents said they are willing to pay more for local and sustainable fare in restaurants; however, that has its limits, as the majority of those said they are only willing to pay a mere 1 to 5 percent more.

When deciding where to eat, 74 percent of patrons based their decision on menu selection followed by pricing and convenient location at 69 percent and 67 percent, respectively. Local/organic ingredients and sustainable ingredients lagged severely behind with only 7 percent of people saying that drove them to a restaurant.

Going green and using local ingredients aren’t the only issues restaurants are facing today. For corporate social responsibility (CSR) initiatives, patrons place the greatest importance on living wages. When Mintel respondents were asked to rate their top three CSR initiatives they named living wages, local ingredients and company-provided medical insurance.

Our most recent consumer study found that 83 percent of respondents want restaurants to offer local fresh fruits and vegetables on their menus, but that seasonal produce holds a slight edge over local. Check out Consumer Trends in Produce 2011 in the Consumer Research Center of the PMA website.

In the Parkersburg, West Virginia, area, several stores have replaced the usual candy in checkout aisles with fresh and dried fruit, jump ropes and other healthful items. On Oct. 8, The Charleston Gazette reported on this trend (print and video), revealing that parents and kids like this change. So do the stores – at one store, sales of certain items have tripled with the new checkout displays. The article also reports about other changes that have increased sales (e.g. onions and peppers displayed in the meat aisle).

This happened at a suggestion from the Mid-Ohio Valley Health Department, which is on board with “making the healthy choice the easy choice” and working with a U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention grant.

This isn’t the first time I’ve heard of this marketing option, and I’ve seen it in stores in my travels. But the energy around this is different. Maybe the time is riper now for this type of approach. When strategies like this make parents, kids, and businesses happy, it’s a big win. Our industry is happily unique in that when our sales go up, so does healthful eating.

Check out the article and video to see what the customers and the retailers have to say about this. Have you tried this in your stores? Have you suggested it to your retail customers? We don’t have to wait for health departments or the CDC to suggest it. Just run with it.

As the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) continues to work on implementing the Food Safety Modernization Act, one of the ways it updates industry is through the agency’s website. Last week I received an update on some frequently asked FSMA questions and thought I’d share them here (in the event you have similar questions):

• FDA was asked about how it might engage partners to conduct compliance inspection and facilitate reporting to better leverage limited governmental resources and staff. FDA responded that “as part of the integrated food safety system and the formation of a national work plan, FDA/ORA have formed a work group to look at how to engage partners. FDA/ORA also have a field management directive (FMD) that outlines improvements in communications between FDA and state agencies.”
• FDA was asked if third-party auditors will have the same authorities and tools of FDA when qualifying imported food companies for entry into the United States. FDA responded that “accredited third-party certification bodies will not be commissioned by FDA nor will they otherwise be in the role of regulatory authority, acting on FDA’s behalf.”
• FDA was asked about prioritizing pilots on overarching food traceability systems. FDA responded that “two pilot projects are being conducted through an existing contract with the Institute of Food Technologists (IFT). IFT will carry out the pilots at the direction of FDA, and the Agency will retain the ultimate decision making authority. IFT will obtain input from the industry sectors and consult with USDA, state agencies and consumer groups on proposed foods and/or ingredients and product tracing technologies.” FDA noted that it is focusing first on those provisions with the greatest public health benefit, such as preventive controls, inspection and compliance, and the import provisions. Product tracing is a component of the Inspection and Compliance Team.

For a complete list of FSMA frequently asked questions, visit the FDA website. There you can sign up to get updates directly from FDA.

Last Friday, a Field to Fork post talked about how our industry can capitalize on the growing momentum of the MyPlate campaign, especially the “make half your plate fruits and vegetables” message (which is being heavily promoted by USDA, PMA and others through the end of this year). Yesterday, I read about a consumer survey that gauged consumer awareness and adoption of these messages.

It found that 46 percent of Americans have heard of the new USDA MyPlate Guidelines, and more than half of those (60 percent) said they may adopt the dietary guidelines for themselves or have already vowed to do so. The youngest group surveyed – those between ages 16 and 34 – are twice as likely as older age groups, 55 years plus, to change their habits (19 percent vs. 9 percent). Females are the most receptive audience to target with MyPlate messaging, with 7 percent more women than men willing to adopt it.

Those resistant to accepting MyPlate included 16 percent who reported they definitely wouldn’t use the guidelines in determining how they feed their families; and 45 percent of those 55 and older who were the least likely to use MyPlate when making family-oriented food decisions.

If you’re doing interesting things with MyPlate to increase fruit and vegetables sales, let us know. As Kathy mentioned last week, we’ve seen the half-a-plate icon appearing in members’ e-mail signatures, while others are running contests to encourage shoppers to adopt the MyPlate messages. This is in addition to the official Fruits and Veggies Video Challenge being run by USDA.

Again, drop me a note if you’re promoting or supporting MyPlate in a unique way (whether that’s through advertising, packaging, web marketing, social media, etc.). We – and USDA – would like to hear about your efforts.

It’s that time of year when industry groups and research firms begin to make predictions for what trends will emerge in the coming 12 months. Recently Technomic issued its forecast on restaurant trends, a few of which included:

• Consumers wanting variety on the foods they’re familiar with. This includes comfort foods with a twist (gourmet, ethnic, artisan, wood-fired) as well as innovation in familiar formats (sandwiches, wraps, pizza, pasta) rather than breakout items taken from less-familiar global cuisines.
• Commodity cost increases will drive simple preparations of fresh ingredients, resulting in operators curtailing purchases of value-added items in favor of cheaper cuts, beans, grains and produce that require more back-of-house prep.
• Continued growth in “local” food. To facilitate flexible purchasing, growers, manufacturers, distributors and operators will continue to work toward a more transparent, safe and efficient supply chain, streamlining workflow, recording every step and reducing waste.
• Social networking gains more ground, influencing sales. Consumers increasingly trust friends and peers more than professional marketers, and are taking control of social media to share their restaurant experiences and opinions with the public.
• Customer access to information will influence sales. Consumers will look for disclosure of everything from calories and allergens on menus to labor and local-sourcing practices. A small but growing number are serious about nutrition, labeling, sustainability and community involvement, and they are using such knowledge to make purchasing decisions.

It will be interesting to watch in the coming months how many of these predictions are on target. Our most recent consumer research found that “local” is important when it comes to fresh fruits and vegetables, with more than two-thirds of consumers considering local as important when buying fresh fruits and vegetables. And, half told us they will make restaurant choices based on availability of local fresh fruits and vegetables. You can check this new study out by visiting our Consumer Trends Research Center.

Speaking of foodservice, in addition to our research, the PMA Foodservice Conference & Expo is the place where restaurant executives and industry leaders meet to connect, do business, and learn about trends. Our 2012 event will be July 20-22 in Monterey, California.