Meat + Poultry - May 2008 - 25

WASHINGTON

Big effort to help small plants
By Bernard Shire
meatpoultry@sosland.com

or a long time, the U.S. Dept. of Agriculture's Food
Safety and Inspection Service has been fighting a
perception that its treatment of small meat and poultry processors is unfair and that the agency could accomplish its mission if it only had to deal with a relatively small
number of large plants instead of huge numbers of very
small plants.
The following perceptions have been strong for years
among small plants - "USDA doesn't care about us" - "the
inspectors wish we would disappear, and they're doing
everything they can to make it hard for us to stay in
business." This feeling was energized by the adoption
of mandatory HACCP for meat and poultry plants 12
years ago that was much harder on small plants
than the giants of the industry.
Ever since HACCP was incorporated in
the meat and poultry industry, USDA has
been trying to help the small industry
adjust to the massive government regulatory changes. The latest effort by FSIS
is the setup of a new, high-level office
that is focusing specifically on reaching
out to small and very small poultry and
meat processing plants. Its mission is also to
improve the training for meat and poultry inspectors and other FSIS personnel.

Focusing smaller
This is not the first time that the federal meat and poultry
inspection agency has tried to help the smaller plants in the
industry - specifically the very small and small plants that
are under its regulatory watch. The new FSIS branch is called
the Office of Outreach, Employee Education and Training
(OOEET). But what's different about it is that the new office will be operating at a very high level in the agency. In
fact, it's at the same level as the agency's other major departments, like the Office of Field Operations, which is in
charge of inspection, and the Office of Public Health and
Science, which focuses on the science of fighting pathogens.
Like the other major sectors of FSIS, this office is headed
by an assistant administrator. The agency stayed inside the
organization and named one of its own, Dr. Karlease Kelly, to run the small industry assistance office. Naming Kelly to this post was a smart move on the part of FSIS, because she is a longtime educator and chief training officer
at the agency. She also happens to be a friendly, outgoing
person, who even as a regulator has supported the role of
the small processing industry in U.S. meat and poultry pro26

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May 2008

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duction. She's a big believer in the value of education, for
both meat and poultry inspectors, as well as the industry
her agency regulates.
Kelly says the establishment of the new office is the latest
step by the agency to implement some of the concerns voiced
by small and very small meat processors after a number of
meetings with the agency over the past few
years. "The goal of this high-level office
is to help small and very small
plants to implement food
safety and public health regulations," Kelly says. "Back
in 2005, FSIS began hosting
listening sessions to learn
what the greatest needs of
these establishments are.
FSIS took all that information
and set up a task force to decide
what to do. The result is this office,
which will help very small and small
plants to both improve their HACCP
plans and to achieve greater regulatory
compliance. We plan to do this through
education and information," she says.
While the agency has been running educational programs for the industry it regulates ever
since HACCP began for meat and poultry plants about 10
years ago, FSIS wasn't quite hitting the mark when it came
to helping the very small and small operations. "We learned
from the listening sessions that the needs of small and very
small plants were greater than what we were offering at the
time," Kelly says. "We also learned that our efforts would be
improved if we put everything - our outreach to the small
and very small plants, as well as our education of our own
people - under one umbrella. Before, various FSIS offices
had this duty, but it wasn't really the top priority for any of
them. For this office, outreach to the small industry and educating our employees is our top, our only responsibility and
priority." She adds that providing training to both small and
very small plant owners and operators, as well as to FSIS
personnel, together whenever possible and practical, would
be a major priority for her.
The new office includes 22 trainers across the country,
with 60 managers and staff members. The trainers are based
in some, but not all, of the FSIS district offices around the
country. Years ago, small and very small plants specializing
in making unique products had a very hard time finding
ways to prove to the government that their manufacturing

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Meat + Poultry - May 2008

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