The California Department of Pesticide Regulation (CDPR) defines Sustainable Pest Management (SPM) as a holistic, whole-system approach to managing pests in agricultural and other managed ecosystems and urban and rural communities that builds on the concept of integrated pest management (IPM) with broader consideration of human health and social equity, environmental protections and economic vitality. 

“A holistic, whole-system approach in agriculture and managed ecosystems…with broader consideration of human health, social equity, environmental protection and economic vitality” seems remarkably consistent in what we are trying to do in fresh produce food safety as well. Ask most growers or food safety professionals about foodborne pathogens and they will quickly describe them as one of their most persistent pests!  

Managing zoonotic pathogens (Salmonella, STEC, Listeria) in our agricultural ecosystem is conceptually similar to managing plant pests that have the potential to impact crop quality, yields, and environmental and public health.  

• Both food safety and plant pest management require risk assessment, prevention strategies, monitoring, corrective actions, documentation and continuous improvement.  

• Both food safety and plant pest management are influenced by weather, water movement, wildlife pressure, adjacent land use, soil amendments and operational practices.  

• Both food safety and plant pest management demand a systems mindset rather than a single-point intervention when trying to optimize outcomes.  

SPM is built upon the tenets of Integrated Pest Management (IPM), but adding onto IPM constructs with intentional prevention-based measures and practices. That’s exactly what our fresh produce food safety strategies need to do as well. Sustainable Food Safety Management (SFSM) would/could be just like the holistic approaches required of SPM, incorporating and aligning within food safety management these sustainable systems-based concepts:  

• Many foodborne pathogens (though, not all) are ecological organisms, existing in the environment in which we grow crops. We must evolve from looking at these simply as “contaminants” to recognizing that these organisms exist within our production space. They move through the area with water, wildlife, soil, air, fugitive dust, human activities and equipment. Their existence in the space is not the only point of interest – we expect them there. Our focus needs to be more about understanding and building systems that consider their presence and predict and prevent the scenarios and factors that amplify our fresh produce food safety risk.  

• Food safety is exactly like SPM, we need to constantly throughout the growing cycle be integrating environmental, animal and crop management activities and assessments to be able to identify trends early. These real-time and on-going systems offer enhanced abilities to be proactive in recognizing patterns that often lead to conditions of risk.  

• Static food safety checklists need to evolve to dynamic food safety forecasting/monitoring like those required, and included, in SPM and IPM strategies. Pest advisors and growers already know that constant eyes on visible signs of pests, imbalances, weather and plant health are critical to staying in front of pest pressure, quality and yields. These experts, and the growers themselves, cultivate crops with constant attention and focus on these pest issues. That same mindset, active data collection and frequent activities are also needed in food safety management practices. Given what science tells us (a lot), it is errant to think that simple static one-size-fits-all requirements will be efficient means to manage food safety risks to crops. We need site-specific dynamic systems to drive adaptive mitigation strategies. 

Food safety and pest management practices are remarkably similar. This similarity offers a unique opportunity to merge existing components/areas of our agricultural businesses together (food safety & pest management). Bringing together these areas of fresh produce production offers not only efficiencies and collaboration across food safety personnel and agricultural operations, but it also offers opportunity to connect existing separate data systems and data points to add depth, layers to relationships and enhance both pest and pathogen predictive models. Ultimately, merging these approaches will help characterize both pest and foodborne pathogen pressures better – officially uniting relationships in program and data formats that have always existed together in the real-world ecosystem. With data and systems integration comes new opportunities, predictive modeling and cross-functional goal alignment. 

Pathogens, like agricultural pests, do not know they are to stop at farm fence lines or fields.  To be effective, growers, livestock operators, water districts, wildlife managers, composters and regulators all must work together, aligning programs, regulations and practices to ensure that all stakeholders support stability and signal coming from the shared ecosystem.    

 Western Growers’ Nexus is a collaborative learning center focused on the intersection of sustainability, ecosystems, agriculture and food safety—bringing science, systems thinking and cross-sector leadership together to advance practical, risk-based solutions for modern fresh produce production.