Ensuring Meat Processing Safety in These Challenging Times

With the rampant spread of COVID-19 among meat processing plant workers, the meat industry continues to face serious issues. The prevalence of the virus has led to meat processing - and packaging - plant closures. It has created bottlenecks everywhere in the chain, affecting farms to consumers, leading to much smaller production outputs and higher prices for everyone. What can be done to ensure the safety of meat during these challenging times?

A Texas A&M AgriLife-led research project funded through USDA’s National Institute of Food and Agriculture is investigating the SARS-CoV-2 impact on meat processing by assessing the risks in a systematic farm-to-plate model. The goal is to maximize safety and minimize viral exposure to meat production workforce employees, and to everyone who buys and consumes meat. For more information, read the NIFA blog.

Workers in meat packing plant. Photo courtesy of Getty Images.

We have reached the midpoint in Phase 3 of Project CAFÉ – not only are we at month three of our six-month sprint, but we have completed 40 percent of the work. So, we are on schedule with making these critical improvements in NIFA processes by our next deadline in June.

As a reminder, these teams are at work addressing seven long-term projects: Determining a tool for grant portfolio data analysis; Enhancing the user experience on NIFA’s public website; Developing recommendations for RFA improvements; Expanding workshops and webinars; Improving payments time to panelists; Developing schedule of program implementation from RFA to award; Launching NIFA talent management system improvements.

This month, we kicked off a new Project CAFÉ initiative to streamline the panel manager hiring process. We also developed guidelines and best practices for hosting webinars for external stakeholders and identified five potential solutions for reducing the honoraria payment cycle times for peer review panelists.

We expect each of these initiatives will greatly improve the customer experience working with NIFA.

Last month we posted two new tools to NIFA’s website to help you locate NIFA experts by Institute or Program Area. Web user data shows us you are using those tools often.

Follow our progress online through the Project Café Dashboard and please continue to give us your feedback so we can continue to improve.

Dr. Carrie Castille
Director, National Institute of Food and Agriculture

NIFA’s Newest National Science Liaison

Sheila Fleischhacker, PhD, JD, RDN is a National Science Liaison for the United States Department of Agriculture’s National Institute of Food and Agriculture and an adjunct professor of law at Georgetown University where she teaches a first-of-its-kind nutrition law and policy course and co-taught (2019, 2020) a unique course on the first 1,000 days of life. Prior to returning to federal service, as founder and president of Fly Health, LLC, she provided public health law research consulting services; one example of her work is a report on the rationale and options to strengthen national nutrition research, which has secured support of 70+ organizations. She also co-founded and co-chaired a Healthy Eating Research and CDC-supported Nutrition and Obesity Policy Research and Evaluation Network ad hoc COVID-19 working group that has grown to 500+ members, collaborates with more than 40 organizations, and has published more than 36 peer-reviewed articles. Previously, she was the senior advisor on nutrition and food safety at USDA Office of the Chief Scientist (2017-2018), on detail from the National Institutes of Health (2012-2018). During her federal service, she helped put forth the first-of-its-kind National Nutrition Research Roadmap and chaired a USDA Inter-Departmental Nutrition Workshop Series. Prior to that, she was an adjunct assistant professor of nutrition at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and the principal investigator for the American Indian Healthy Eating Project and its subsequent capacity building project known as Healthy Native North Carolinians. Dr. Fleischhacker received her B.S. in 2000 and J.D. in 2007, with a Certificate in Health Law from Loyola University Chicago and Ph.D. in Integrative Biosciences/Nutritional Sciences from the Pennsylvania State University in 2004. Her post-doctoral training focused on urban and regional planning and public health nutrition at the University of North Carolina. She completed her Registered Dietitian Nutritionist internship through a distance program at Iowa State University in 2018. She was admitted into the Illinois Bar in November 2007.

Secretary Vilsack on USDA Role in Building Markets Based on Climate-Smart Ag

The Agriculture Secretary believes his department needs to be active in efforts to develop new climate-smart agricultural markets for producers. USDA’s Rod Bain talks with Agricultural Secretary Tom Vilsack about the role USDA will take on climate-smart ag. For more information, listen to the USDA broadcast.

Special Enrollment Period 2021

Need health insurance? A special enrollment period is now open through HealthCare. Gov where you will find information about assister programs and tools to help existing and new Health Insurance Marketplace participants. Time is limited so enroll before May 15, 2021. For more information or to enroll, go online to HealthCare.Gov.

Health insurance graphic courtesy of Getty Images.

New Study Examines Importance and Unique Characteristics of U.S. Female Farmers  

While women can be drawn into farming for many reasons, researchers in Penn State’s College of Agricultural Sciences have found that female-owned farms in the U.S. are more common in areas that are closer to urban markets, that engage in agritourism activity, and that offer greater access to childcare. The USDA changed the way it counts the operators of farms in its most recent Census of Agriculture, allowing for up to four principal operators per farm. This has inflated the number of female operators somewhat, but female participation in agriculture is nonetheless at an all-time high. This project was funded by USDA’s National Institute of Food and Agriculture and by Hatch/Multi-State Appropriations. Future research will look at the impact of female-owned farms on local economic and agricultural conditions. For more information, read the Penn State news article.  

Female farmer. Photo courtesy of Getty Images.

International Research Team Receives $1 Million Grant to Build Multi-Disciplinary Precision Livestock Farming Network  

A team of international researchers led by Michigan State University (MSU) has received a five-year, $1 million grant from USDA’s Data Science for Food and Agricultural Systems (DSFAS) program, a component of the National Institute of Food and Agriculture. One of the main priorities of the DSFAS program is the formation of Coordinated Innovation Networks that solve critical problems in food and agriculture production. The newly funded project is aimed at establishing a multidisciplinary network of researchers in animal science, computer science and engineering to improve computer vision systems in precision livestock farming. Ideally, these powerful computer vision systems will allow producers to make real-time management decisions at the individual animal level, increasing productivity and profits. MSU’s Departments of Animal Science and Fisheries and Wildlife Associate Professor Juan Steibel, is the principal investigator. For more information, read the MSU news article.

Pig image courtesy of the MSU Swine Teaching and Research Facility.

AFRI’s Agricultural Literacy and Workforce Development Evaluation and Outcomes in Participant Career Development Priority Areas

This webinar will provide information on the eligibility, goals and objectives of the Agricultural Literacy and Workforce Development Evaluation (ALE) and Outcomes in Participant Career Development (OCPD) priority areas within NIFA’s AFRI’s-Education and Workforce Development request for applications. ALE seeks proposals to provide a programmatic review of NIFA’s Agricultural Literacy and Workforce Development portfolio; while OCPD seeks proposals to develop, pilot, and maintain mechanisms that track impacts of NIFA's investment on individual career development beyond their participation in a NIFA-supported scholarship or fellowship program. An informational ALE/OCPD webinar will be held March 8, from 12 to 1 p.m. (ET). For more information or to preregister for this webinar, go online to NIFA’s webinar announcement.

Upcoming Cooperative Extension Webinar

Extension Collaborative on Immunization Teaching & Engagement (EXCITE): Landscape Assessment and Application for Funding webinar March 10, 2020. 3 to 4 p.m. (ET). Go online to register for this webinar.