The Global Food Safety Initiative (GFSI) accepted the AMS Specialty Crops Inspection (SCI) application for continued technical equivalence to GFSI benchmarking requirements for government entities.  Earlier this year, SCI incorporated necessary edits to the Harmonized Standard to maintain alignment to Version 2020 of GFSI’s Benchmarking Requirements. SCI has renewed its MOU between AMS and GFSI to formalize the acknowledgement of technical equivalence. Donna Burke-Fonda, Chief of SCI's Audit Services Division says "Our work to renew our GFSI technical equivalence is just another way that SCI is working to provide audit services that meet the evolving and multi-dimensional needs of our customers, both big and small."  GFSI’s acknowledgement of the USDA Harmonized GAP Plus+ audit as equivalent, and the alignment of the USDA standards to the FDA Produce Safety rule, allows the specialty crops supply chain to use a single USDA GAP audit to meet international and other marketing and regulatory requirements to increase market access and confidence in the safety of their products.  

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We are excited to announce promotions of USDA professionals to leadership roles to benefit the specialty crops industry. Heather Pichelman & Ken Petersen have accepted positions as Associate Deputy Administrators of the Specialty Crops Program.  

Heather Pichelman has worked in a variety of roles at the U.S. Department of Agriculture since 2006.  She began her USDA career as an attorney in the Office of the General Counsel, where she worked on a wide range of AMS marketing and regulatory issues.  In 2014, she transitioned to the Agricultural Marketing Service’s Specialty Crops Program (SCP) as the Director of the Promotion and Economics Division, that oversees specialty crop research and promotion programs and evaluates the effect of changes in market conditions of SCP agricultural commodities.  In 2020, Heather served as Acting Associate Deputy Administrator in the SCP Office of the Deputy Administrator, where she gained firsthand experience overseeing the daily operations of SCP’s Divisions and helped to carry out Program objectives efficiently and effectively. She then was selected as AMS’s Presidential Transition Coordinator, creating briefing materials on agency key initiatives and attending briefings with the Administration transition team.  In 2021, Heather was chosen to be Acting Chief of Staff in the Marketing and Regulatory Programs mission area, where she worked closely with Deputy Under Secretary Mae Wu on AMS, APHIS and overall Administration priorities.  Heather is a graduate of American University with a B.A. in Communications, Legal Institutions, and Economics and Government. She earned her Juris Doctor degree from the George Mason University School of Law.

Ken Petersen has extensive experience in the area of fruit and vegetable production and marketing, including the past 22 years with the USDA AMS Specialty Crops Inspection Division.  He is a graduate of Delaware Valley University with a B.S. in Horticulture and earned a certificate in Public Leadership from the Brookings Institution.  Ken started with USDA in 1999 as an agricultural commodity grader in Philadelphia, transferring to Washington DC in 2004 as a staff assistant.  In 2005, he became the team lead for the USDA Good Agricultural Practices (GAP) Program and worked to develop and expand audit-based programs requested by the specialty crops industry.  Ken became Branch Chief of SCI’s Audit Services Branch in 2012, leading efforts to achieve technical equivalence by the Global Food Safety Initiative and the development of three audit-based export certification programs for almonds, pistachios and seeds for sprouts destined to the European Union.  In 2020, Ken accepted a promotion as the associate director for National Programs Mission Support where he oversaw the Division’s collaborative projects with the AMS Commodity Procurement Program, the Defense Logistics Agency feeding subsistence program, and the Foreign Agricultural Service on aflatoxin trade issues with the EU and Japan.