Gina Reo, Advisor to the American Bakers Association and President of Quality Assurance Strategies was featured in the Food Safety Series in Baking & Snack Magazine. She discusses the Food Safety Modernization Act (FSMA), allergens, and labeling.
From the article:
Food allergy is the condition caused by a reaction to naturally occurring protein in a food or a food ingredients. In the US, the eight major allergens are milk, eggs, fish, crustacean shellfish (shrimp, crab, lobster), peanut, soybean, tree nuts (almond, walnut, cashew, etc.) and wheat.
While FSMA is transforming food production to create a safer supply, allergens still pose a significant health concern in the food industry, which has seen little reduction in allergen recalls since the introduction of
FSMA, according to Gina Reo, president of quality assurance strategies and advisor to the American Bakers Association. The US Food & Drug Administration (FDA)’s Food CGMP Modernization Report outlined six allergen control components with cleaning procedure validation of food-contact equipment particularly concerning to investigators on plant visits. Further, bakery customers and consumers are driving manufacturing
vigilance to provide clean, accurate labels.
