food safety

The Western Center for Food Safety—a joint effort between UC Davis’ School of Veterinary Medicine and the College of Agricultural and Environmental Sciences—will join several other California organizations to launch a multi-year study to improve food safety through enhanced understanding of the ecology of human pathogens in the environment that may cause food-borne illness outbreaks, according to a U.S. Food and Drug Administration announcement today.

Livestock grazing could be beneficial for organic farming systems. To see if the practice poses any food safety risks, university, government and nonprofit partners - including the school's Alda Pires - will receive a nearly $1 million U.S. Department of Agriculture Specialty Crop Multistate Program grant to study the impacts of livestock grazing of cover crops on bacterial population dynamics, soil building and environmental health.