This week, FMI hosted a three-day training session that allows food retailers and other interested parties to become preventive controls qualified individuals (PCQI) as defined by FDA through a curriculum developed through the Food Safety Preventive Controls Alliance (FSPCA). Under the preventive controls rule, certain food safety tasks must be performed by a PCQI. We trained representatives from several FMI member companies, who are now qualified to perform many of the tasks required under FSMA.

The industry is facing some unique pressures including increasing consumer focus on health and wellness, fresh prepared foods and a desire for more information about their food. To arm meat industry professionals with a 360 degree view of current meat trends, FMI and the North American Meat Institute host the industry for the Annual Meat Conference held this year in Nashville, Tennessee at the Gaylord Opryland, from February 21-23. As we set the stage to showcase the latest meat trends, here are some highlights of what meat industry professionals can expect.

Consumers have always mentally weighed and emotionally entertained multiple factors when making their decisions about the food products they are considering. For years, those variables could easily be summarized in the easy formula of three words; price, taste and convenience. Those three factors still loom large in the shopper’s thought process, but an evolution in consumer thinking is pushing a number of new considerations, resulting in a much more complex, multi-factored consumer value equation. New research by Deloitte, developed in collaboration with FMI and GMA, probes the breadth, depth and richness of those new factors.

While I thought 2015 would go down as the “year of the label,” it appears that labeling will continue to be the center of our attention for months to come. In a world of multi-channel communication, many of us question the efficaciousness of labels, especially when they attempt to convey too much information within the confines of limited packaging real estate, but still labels appear to be the duct tape of the legislative world – the solution that will fix all ills. This begins to beg the question, “Is labeling the best means of achieving transparency and offering consumers the information they want?” FMI is presently deeply engaged in advocacy action surrounding two labeling issues of crucial importance to the food retail industry.