We are rooting for you! Lessons & key takeaways from this fall’s root vegetable recalls

Recalled carrots and onions were all over the news this past fall, here are some produce safety factors to keep in mind to prevent similar headlines!

This fall there was a serious recall of organic carrots due to E.coli contamination. If you’re a fan of McDonalds, or “the arches” as my family says, then you also probably heard of an onion recall.

In November I was shopping at the grocery store, looking at carrots, when an elderly woman commented, “I can’t believe the recalled carrots were organic!” I told her about my role as a produce safety professional and how much I’ve learned about the food system. Even organic carrots are grown in the dirt and moved along packing lines! What may not be common knowledge, however, is how those factors along with the growing, harvesting, handling, and crop characteristics of root vegetables affect food safety. For you farmers, it’s important to understand these crop characteristics, especially when completing a risk assessment of your operation (i.e. the new Agricultural Water Assessment, or “AWA”).

Throughout this article, bolded words = a farm or crop characteristic that should be included in your risk assessments.

While risk is inherent on every farm, root crops are dirty because they are grown in the dirt, and that has its own risks. Even in a drip irrigation system, the irrigation water contacts the edible portion of the crop— the roots—even without any water contact above ground! Thus, this irrigation water must “be safe and of adequate sanitary quality for its intended use” (§112.41).

The Produce Safety Rule doesn’t require produce washing, but if produce is dirty, it will likely be washed before they go to market. Whenever water is used after harvest, it must have no detectable generic E. coli (§112.44). Especially in recirculated or batch water systems, it takes a lot of management and monitoring to ensure that water remains “safe and of adequate sanitary quality” (§112.41) throughout its use. This is crucial, as water is an amplification point: If one poopy piece of produce goes into a batch of water, the surrounding water and produce also become poopy.

But in the case of onions, water is not typically used after harvest due to quality reasons (wet onions = bad, moldy onions). In this system, a “dry” cleaning takes place instead of a “wet” cleaning.

Regardless of the type of cleaning method used, if a food contact surface is not properly cleaned, then any pathogens that are present will cross-contaminate the produce that touches it. The Produce Safety Rule requires that equipment and tools “intended or likely to contact” produce must be inspected, maintained, cleaned (of visible filth), and sanitized (when necessary) as frequently as needed (§112.123).

Basically, if it looks dirty (there’s visible filth), and you wouldn’t serve dinner on it, it needs to be cleaned. This is one of the lessons from the 2024 onion outbreak: equipment had debris and biofilms, even after “cleaning.” Some equipment was also not properly dried after sanitization and was also cleaned with the wrong concentrations.

Thus, it’s important to assess what equipment you are using, how it can be cleaned, and how often you should be cleaning it. There are all types of root vegetable cleaning equipment, all with their unique challenges. Here are some examples of equipment I commonly see on-farm in the wash/pack for root vegetables:

Brush Washers and Conveyers: efficient but it is hard to get inside and clean. Brushes and rollers are also hard to clean and keep free of visible filth. Styrofoam is a porous surface and isn’t cleanable! “Elbow grease”, frequent cleanings, and routine “deep” cleans are green flags in managing this equipment.

Barrel washer: Wood is cleanable but must air dry completely. It is not able to be sanitized! Some barrel washers are available in steel or plastic. While these materials are easier to clean and can be sanitized, there are still a lot of nooks & crannies to harbor debris and pathogens! Barrel washers take “elbow grease” to properly clean and remove visible filth.

Spray table: An accessible, easy piece of equipment to build for washing root vegetables! However, wood cannot be sanitized (only cleaned and air dried), and the hardware cloth has a lot of surface area for bacteria and pathogens to harbor if not properly cleaned and sanitized. “Elbow grease” and frequent cleaning is key here!

In any wash/pack system, awareness and monitoring is key. Regardless of whether batch water, dry cleaning, or wet cleaning is used, all these methods require proper training and monitoring to make sure these processes are effective.

Employees (volunteers, family, etc.) are your first line of defense. The Produce Safety Rule requires that anyone who handles produce receives adequate training upon hiring, at least once annually, and “as necessary and appropriate in light of observations indicating personnel are not meeting standards” (§112.21a-d). They must be trained in principles of food safety and in the importance of health & hygiene (illness symptoms, and handwashing, among other topics) (§112.22). This reflects another lesson shared from the 2024 onion outbreak: employees were not practicing proper hygiene. Without leading by example, manager awareness and monitoring, and establishing a culture of food safety, employees will not feel empowered or supported in following hygiene practices like proper handwashing or correctly implementing cleaning policies. Invest in your team!

Produce Safety Technicians are a safe place to share and discuss on-farm produce safety. Prevention is key— it’s a lot easier to prevent harmful pathogens from getting on produce, because once on/in produce, there is no way to remove them (unless it’s going to be really cooked). If you need assistance in navigating how prevention looks like for your operation, the MI On-Farm Produce Safety Team is here and rooting for you (pun intended)! The lessons from this fall’s recalls are valuable, but we would rather help protect you (the farmers and packers) and the consumer and prevent them from happening in the first place.

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Article by Morgan Anderson, Produce Safety Technician