Posts By: Gustavo Reyes
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CA LGMA Metrics, Issue 6 Water: Open Comment Period Webinar
We invite you to join us for a webinar to review the comments submitted during the CA LGMA open comment period for Issue 6 Water. This will be an opportunity to provide feedback and to hear from those that submitted comments We look forward to your input as we work together to build practical, science-based guidance leafy greens. Webinar Details Date:…
What’s New in the Literature This Week (5/11/2026)
This week’s food safety literature highlights several topics for the fresh produce industry, including PFAS mitigation, pathogen survival on strawberries, emerging sanitation technologies for fresh-cut lettuce, and decision-support tools for evaluating microbial hazards in ready-to-eat fresh produce. PFAS mitigation in soil, water, fruits, and vegetables A new scoping review in…
What 2.5 Years of Working on GreenLink® Have Taught Me About Data Science in Produce Safety
Last week, the Western Growers Science staff had the opportunity to present on GreenLink® during the Western Food Safety Conference. The presentation focused on how data science is transforming produce food safety and how GreenLink® is helping the industry move from compliance snapshots toward a more practical, data-driven food safety culture. For me, developing this…
LGMA Metrics Comment Period Extended for 2026 Agricultural Water Metrics Update
The comment period for proposed changes to the California Leafy Greens Marketing Agreement-approved metrics related to agricultural water metrics has been extended from May 13, 2026, to May 20, 2026, due to requests for additional time from stakeholders. The comment period originally opened on Monday, April 13, 2026, to provide stakeholders an opportunity to review the proposed…
New Resources Available: Bird Activity & Rodent Management
Western Growers Science has released two new, quick-reference resources designed to support practical, risk-based decision-making in produce operations. These tools focus on managing bird activity and rodent pressure, translating current science into clear, actionable practices that can be applied in the field. Bird Activity Mitigation (Access Here) This resource provides a…
LGMA Metrics: Comment Period Opens for 2026 Agricultural Water Metrics Update
The comment period for the proposed changes to the California Leafy Greens Marketing Agreement (LGMA)-approved metrics related to the water metrics (Issue 6) opened on Monday, April 13, and will close on Wednesday, May 13. To submit your comments: Visit the leafy green guidance website (https://www.leafygreenguidance.com/). In the Home tab, scroll down to the “Submit Comments”…
EPA and HHS Announce Coordinated Action on Microplastics
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) recently announced a series of coordinated actions to better understand and address microplastics, with a particular focus on drinking water and potential human health impacts. The initiative includes expanded federal research, efforts to improve detection and measurement methods, and…
What the Latest IFSAC Report Tells Us About Foodborne Illness and Why It Matters
On March 27th, 2026, The Interagency Food Safety Analytics Collaboration (IFSAC), released its latest annual source attribution report. These reports are designed to estimate which broad food categories are most commonly associated with foodborne illness caused by pathogens, including Salmonella, E. coli O157, and Listeria monocytogenes. The data in this 2023-year report uses 49,848…
How the Same Data Can Lead to Different Conclusions
Have you ever heard the saying “data does not lie, people do”? The saying captures a real challenge in data analysis: numbers do not interpret themselves. People decide what to measure, how to clean the data, which methods to use, and how to present the results. Those choices can shape the conclusions just as much as the data themselves. Data are simply observations, the…
New Study Introduces Framework for REP Strains of Foodborne Pathogens
A new peer-reviewed article published in the Journal of Food Protection introduces a framework for describing Reoccurring, Emerging, and Persisting (REP) strains of foodborne pathogens. The paper, written by scientists from CDC, FDA, USDA-FSIS, Association of Public Health Laboratories, ASRT, Inc., and Gret Hill Solutions, outlines a framework for understanding strains that cause…
Registration Open: California Longitudinal Study (CALS) Industry Briefing – March 4
Registration is now open for the upcoming California Longitudinal Study (CALS) Industry Briefing, hosted by the California Department of Food & Agriculture (CDFA). The California Longitudinal Study (CALS) is a multi-year, systems-based research effort focused on understanding how pathogens behave in real agricultural environments like the Salinas Valley. By tracking water, soil,…
New Practical Food Safety Resources – Training Programs and Soil Amendments Dos and Don’ts.
Western Growers Science has released two new, quick-reference resources designed to support everyday food safety, one focused on worker training and the other on soil amendment handling. Both tools translate these topics into clear, actionable practices that teams can apply to your operations FAQ: Building a Comprehensive Worker Training Program (Access Here) This FAQ provides a…
FDA Launches New Interactive Tool for Total Diet Study Results
On January 27, 2026, The U.S. Food and Drug Administration released a new interactive tool, the Total Diet Study Interface (TDSi), that makes it easier to explore and download results from the agency’s long-running Total Diet Study. Along with the launch of TDSi, FDA also shared the latest round of data from fiscal years 2021 and 2022, expanding the publicly available TDS results to cover…
Why Counts Cannot be Used for Comparisons. Why the Denominator Matters.
When looking at data, and data summaries, we tend to focus on count data. There were three (3) positive tests. There were ten (10) customer complaints. There were two (2) incidents last month. Counts feel concrete, intuitive and easy to compare, so they often become the first, and sometimes the only, numbers we look at. But counts alone rarely tell the full story… A count tells…
Understanding Trends – Seeing the Story in Food Safety Data
Food safety programs collect a lot of information. Samples are taken, records are filled out, results are reviewed, and reports are filed. Yet one of the most common challenges across the industry is not a lack of data, it is knowing what that data is telling us and how to interpret it. This is where trend analysis becomes valuable. Rather than focusing on individual results, trend analysis…
Data 101: Understanding Statistical Significance
It has been a while since the last Data 101 episode; things have been busy! For this new post, I want to break down one of the most common (and commonly misunderstood) concepts in data analysis: statistical significance, p-values, And the basic idea behind hypothesis testing What is Statistical Significance? Statistical significance is a way to…
The Predictive Power of YOUR Data
Data, Data, Data… Over the past decade, almost every conversation I’ve had as it relates to food safety seems to revolve around data. The promise is always the same: if we just collect enough of it, we’ll uncover the answers to all our problems. And honestly, data can solve many challenges. But it’s equally important to recognize what data cannot do, and even more critical, to…
FDA Updates Information Sharing for Foodborne Outbreaks and Investigations
Earlier this month, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) announced a significant shift toward greater data transparency in its handling of foodborne illness investigations. The agency will now routinely publish Executive Incident Summary (EIS) Abstracts and Foodborne Outbreak Overview of Data (FOOD) Reports once an investigation is complete. Executive Incident Summary (EIS)…
From the Western Growers Science Library: Transition Resources
This article marks the latest installment of our “From the Western Growers Science Library” series. In this edition, we highlight Transition Resources, collection of Western Growers’ materials and other key industry resources to support leafy greens stakeholders during critical seasonal shifts. These transitions are critical times for growers, shippers, and handlers as production…
Updates on the LGMA Romaine Test & Learn Program Open Comment Period Webinar
Date: September 25, 2025 Time: 11:00 AM PT The California Leafy Greens Marketing Agreement (LGMA) has extended the Romaine Test & Learn (T&L) Program for two additional years beyond its original 2025 conclusion. With this extension, new data reporting requirements and updates to Issue 17 metrics are now proposed. This webinar will provide: An overview of the program extension…