The U.S. Department of Agriculture's Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS) is requesting comment on proposed pathogen reduction performance standards for Salmonella in raw contaminated pork and raw pork cuts. FSIS is also requesting comment on how it plans to assess whether establishments producing these products are effectively addressing Salmonella, using a moving window of FSIS sampling results.

If the proposed pathogen reduction performance standards are finalized, FSIS will determine individual establishment performance based on the previous 52 weeks of FSIS Salmonella sample results. FSIS will then report on its website the category of each establishment subject to the performance standard.

FSIS invites interested persons to submit comments on this notice, which was published in the Federal Register on February 16, 2022. All comments must be submitted by April 18, 2022. Comments may be submitted by one of the following methods:

• Federal eRulemaking Portal: This website provides commenters the ability to type short comments directly into the comment field on the web page or to attach a file for lengthier comments. Visit https://www.regulations.gov. Follow the instructions at that site for submitting comments.
• Mail: Send to Docket Clerk, U.S. Department of Agriculture, Food Safety and Inspection Service, 1400 Independence Avenue SW, Mailstop 3758, Washington, D.C. 20250-3700.
• Hand- or courier-delivered submittals: 1400 Independence Avenue SW, Jamie L. Whitten Building, Room 350-E, Washington, D.C. 20250-3700.

More information on the proposed rule is available here.

FSIS is also requesting proposals for a cooperative agreement to collaborate on two risk assessments: one for Salmonella in chicken and another for Salmonella in turkey. These risk assessments will provide scientific support for FSIS to develop a revised framework for controlling Salmonella in poultry. FSIS will evaluate both preharvest and postharvest intervention strategies and assess the impact of reducing Salmonella levels and the prevalence of subtypes of public health concern (e.g., Typhimurium, Enteritidis, Infantis) on the rate of Salmonella illnesses from chicken and turkey consumption.

FSIS is seeking proposals from a multi-disciplinary team to support these risk assessments. The team should include individuals who can make industry data available to FSIS in a confidential and secure manner, including data on Salmonella levels and subtypes in chicken and turkey, both pre- and postharvest. The team should also have expertise in dose-response modeling that takes into consideration differences in Salmonella virulence among subtypes. Multi-disciplinary teams may be from multiple institutions and must designate a single principal investigator from a U.S. organization. FSIS encourages collaborations that include minority serving institutions.

The cooperative agreement announcement will be posted on Grants.gov on March 1, 2022. Proposals must be submitted to FSIS by May 16, 2022.