Group Releases USDA Listing of Salmonella Failures

WASHINGTON, D.C. — Food & Water Watch, a nonprofit consumer rights group, has released an update of a 2006 report detailing the names of chicken producers who have failed to meet federal standards for Salmonella.

The names of these failing plants have never been publicly released by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the group said.

The new report lists 27 broiler chicken plants in 16 states that failed at least one Salmonella testing period in 2006 or 2007. The testing results, which were obtained through the Freedom of Information Act, are from the USDA’s routine sampling program for Salmonella. To date, USDA has never publicly released information on which plants failed to meet Salmonella standards, despite an announcement that it would start doing so in 2007, the group said.

Earlier this year, the USDA changed its testing program with a new policy that delays testing at plants that met Salmonella standards in the past. An analysis of past testing data from the 27 plants with recent failures shows that this new policy could have delayed testing during periods of poor performance at six of these plants.

The group is calling for USDA to seek legislation to make microbial testing performance standards enforceable, publish on its Web site the results of Salmonella testing for every plant and abandon a proposal to reduce the frequency of testing at plants with previous good performance.

During a testing period, the USDA is supposed to take samples during 51 consecutive days of broiler chicken production. If a plant has more than 12 samples test positive for Salmonella during that period, they fail to meet the standard.