Ep. 204. Spink and Fenoff: How to Prevent Food Fraud in Your Supply Chain

Summary

Podcast Summary: Food Safety Matters

Episode 204: "Spink and Fenoff: How to Prevent Food Fraud in Your Supply Chain"
Date: October 28, 2025
Host: Food Safety Magazine
Guests: Dr. John Spink (Michigan State University) & Dr. Roy Fenoff (The Citadel)

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Episode Overview

This episode centers on the urgent and complex topic of food fraud within global supply chains, focusing on how food safety professionals can recognize, assess, and prevent fraud-related risks. Experts Dr. John Spink and Dr. Roy Fenoff share their multidimensional insights—from both supply chain and criminological perspectives—and discuss practical strategies and resources for strengthening supply chain defenses against fraud. The episode also touches on recent regulatory and legislative food safety news, setting a vivid context for the main discussion.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

Introduction to Food Fraud in the Supply Chain

[33:30 – 34:45]

• Food fraud is not just a theoretical issue or an economic inconvenience—it can have profound food safety consequences.
• It's “more sophisticated and global than it's ever been” (Fenoff, 34:20), requiring advanced and collaborative prevention methods.

Why Food Fraud is Urgent & Misunderstood

[35:06 – 36:58]

• The food industry often overlooks or misunderstands fraud until a crisis occurs.
• Food fraud isn’t traditionally part of the safety conversation, as it's seen as separate from microbial contamination.
• "The key is that food fraud is a potential source, a root cause, of a food safety incident." (Spink, 36:01)

Food Fraud’s Intersection with Food Safety

[36:58 – 39:38]

• Fraud often appears to be an “economic issue,” but dilutions, substitutions, or mislabeling can introduce toxins or allergens.
• Example: The 2008 melamine in milk scandal (China) and the recent cinnamon applesauce incident in the U.S.

Quote:
"Whenever the integrity of the food is compromised, you create an uncertainty about what’s really in it. And uncertainty is the enemy of food safety."
— Dr. Roy Fenoff [38:00]

Common Vulnerabilities and Opportunities for Fraud

[40:40 – 44:38]

• Supply chain complexity and speed, international sourcing, and high-value/processed ingredients are frequent targets (e.g., spice adulteration, olive oil fraud, seafood mislabeling).
• Weak regulatory oversight and forged documentation create additional entry points for fraudsters.
• “Fraudsters also exploit documentation and labeling. And so paperwork can be forged far more easily than food itself.” (Fenoff, 44:00)

Supply Chain Disruptions and Fraud Risk

[44:38 – 46:16]

• Crises like wars or pandemics make disruptions and ‘something outside the norm’ more common, creating windows for fraudsters to act.
• Emergency spot purchasing and deviation from SOPs increase vulnerabilities.

Tools & Methods for Detecting and Preventing Food Fraud

[46:16 – 47:55]

• Vulnerability assessment is key: moving from “risk” analysis—which is often stymied by limited incident data—to vulnerability-based assessments.
• First steps resemble a “primary care” screening: identify the most likely risks and escalate deeper investigations as needed.
• "When you have a very... relative to food safety incidents or regular quality incidents, we have exponentially fewer [fraud] incidents. It's harder to study." (Spink, 46:36)

Elements of a Food Fraud Vulnerability Assessment

[47:55 – 51:22]

• GFSI compliance now requires fraud vulnerability assessments across all products.
• Companies must understand their inherent risks, document findings, and update annually or when disruption occurs.
• Documentation review is essential, as paperwork enables fraud to slip by unnoticed.

Getting Started:

• Spink's site (foodfraudprevention.com) offers free resources, primers, and courses.
• Start small: short videos, basic document creation, then build toward deeper analysis as needed.

Implementing a Food Fraud Prevention Strategy

[51:22 – 62:13]

• Start with basic documentation: even “open a Word document and title it ‘My Food Fraud Prevention Strategy’” as a first step (Spink, 60:58).
• Identify an executive sponsor, define team members, outline covered products and standards.
• Adapt the level of detail to the complexity and vulnerabilities of your company and supply chain.

Quote:
"The attendees leave the course not just with the knowledge they've obtained, but with practical tools that they can actually take back and implement real change."
— Dr. Roy Fenoff [60:21]

Criminological Perspective: Opportunity & Guardianship

[53:54 – 57:43]

• Fraud varies: “Situational… Place matters, situations matter, and the product matters too.” (Fenoff, 55:32)
• High-value products, attractive targets, and “absence of a capable guardian” create fraud opportunities.
• Increasing “guardianship” (oversight, monitoring, secure documentation) reduces risk.

Memorable Example:
"It's just a sticker... I can... buy the inorganic tomatoes that are on sale, put the organic stickers on them, go down to Hobby Lobby, make sure you do it on a Saturday....and you can upsell them because organics will sell at a much higher price point."
— Dr. Roy Fenoff [56:06]

Making Fraud Prevention Accessible

[60:58 – 62:13]

• The process can be overwhelming; their workshop and online resources aim to lower the bar for entry, easing professionals into the practice with humor and simplicity before advancing to more complex concepts.

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Memorable Quotes

• “Uncertainty is the enemy of food safety.”
  — Dr. Roy Fenoff [38:00]
• "Food fraud, like the work we're doing on document fraud, we haven't found anybody that's working in that space."
  — Dr. John Spink [65:47]
• "It seems very informal to them, but it's very accessible because then they're just filling in the blanks."
  — Dr. John Spink [62:00]
• "Situational. Place matters, situation matters, and the product matters too."
  — Dr. Roy Fenoff [55:32]

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• Food Fraud—Urgency and Complexity: 33:30 – 36:58
• Intersection with Food Safety & Consequences: 36:58 – 39:38
• Supply Chain Vulnerabilities: 40:40 – 44:38
• Disruptions Increasing Fraud Risk: 44:38 – 46:16
• Vulnerability Assessments: 46:29 – 51:22
• Strategies & Practical Implementation: 51:22 – 62:13
• Motivation, Opportunity, and Guardianship (Criminology): 53:54 – 57:43
• Bringing Prevention to Practice: 60:58 – 62:13
• Personal Impact & Challenges: 64:28 – 67:01

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Tone and Takeaways

The conversation is both authoritative and approachable, mixing practical advice with humor ("open a Word document and type 'My Food Fraud Prevention Strategy'"), and is underscored by a sense of urgency and real-world impact. Both guests stress that food fraud is a moving target—complex, dynamic, and always evolving—but within the grasp of professionals who focus on vulnerability, assessment, and adaptive prevention strategies.

For listeners:

• Food fraud is not just about economics but is a root-cause risk to food safety.
• Prevention starts with awareness, vulnerability assessment, and accessible resources.
• Every company—even those just starting—can take credible steps to assess and mitigate fraud risks in their supply chains.

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For further information and free resources:
Visit foodfraudprevention.com for primers, assessment tools, and online courses as recommended by Dr. Spink and Dr. Fenoff.

Transcript

[A]

Foreign.

[B]

Hello, everyone, and welcome to Food Safety Matters, the podcast for food safety professionals. I'm Stacy Acheson, publisher, Food Safety magazine, and I'm here along with my co hosts, Adrian Blum, our editorial director, and Bob Ferguson, president of Strategic Consulting. So I kind of just want to start out with a little reminder here that for us here at Food Safety Matters, every day is audience appreciation day. As a. I was kind of writing it out like, we appreciate you. It's like every day. Every day is audience appreciation day here. So. Yes. And that means you guys. Dear listeners, that's you. We know that you're all very busy, and we just want to thank you for spending some of that valuable time with us. So thank you. So let's start, like we do, with a sneak peek of today's interview. Adrienne.

[C]

Yes. So today I'm talking with Dr. John Spink and Dr. Roy Fenoff about the intricacies of food fraud in global supply chains and how food safety and quality professionals can prevent it in their supply chains and products. And we also talk about Dr. Spink and Dr. Fenoff's food fraud prevention workshop and certificate course, which will be back by popular Demand at the 2026 Franchise Food Safety Summit in Rosemont, Illinois. So make sure to mark your calendars for that workshop on Monday, May 11th.

[B]

Ah, yes, the 2026 Food Safety Summit. I'm glad you brought it up, Adrian, so that I can remind it. See, I'm just full of reminders today. I can remind everybody to keep their eyes peeled. We've been working very hard on the program for next year's conference, and we'll be able to announce the full agenda very soon, like next month, which we're very close to at this point. So there you go. And as always, early bird rates and the very special Food Safety Matters podcast discount applies, so there's no need to wait. Whereas I like to say it's never too soon to make a good decision, so use discount code FSMATTERS20, and that will get you an extra 20% off of the early bird rate. So, all in. That's a 30% savings on your registration. See, I told you. Every day is audience appreciation day for Safety Matters. So if I was writing this down, you would know that I would, as I do in my emails and such. Insert winky face. So winky face inserted. And that may seem a little just silly to everybody, but there it is. Insert winky face.

[D]

We're doing our winky faces right now live.

[B]

There it is. All right, all right. Enough of that, but not enough of the 20, the savings and all that. That's good. That's good anymore. Yeah. Much more of that. Well, that's pretty good. So let's start news, Adrian.

[C]

Yeah, so first I want to keep you updated on this evolving situation with furloughed federal food safety and public health workers, some of whom are now being terminated. So President Trump is following through on his threats to lay off furloughed federal workers as the government shutdown drags on. It is still going on as of the time of this recording. We'll see what happens in the near future. But what happened is the Trump administration sent termination emails to approximately 1300 staffers at the CDC on Friday, October 10th, only to quickly reverse half of the firings, according to reporting by the New York Times. So although some of the staffers have since been reinstated, public health professionals quickly took to social media to express shock and outrage at the initial firing of the entire staff and editors of CDC's Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report, or the MMWR, which has been published since 1952. The MMWR is the CDC's primary vehicle for scientific publication of public health information related to disease outbreaks, including foodborne illness outbreaks, public health emergencies, and other trends and events. So additionally, 70 Epidemic Intelligence Service officers who are responsible for investigating disease outbreaks, including foodborne illnesses, were fired and then rehired in the storm of Reduction in Force notices, according to reporting by Reuters. The Department of Health and Human Services blamed the accidental firings on a coding error. Sources, including CNN, say that close to 700 CDC staffers were rehired, while approximately 600 remain laid off. HHS already experienced mass firings and restructuring in March, shortly after the Trump administration took power. Around 3,500 FDA workers and 2,400 CDC staffers have already been let go, and several top scientific experts and department heads at CDC resigned after Trump appointed CDC Director Susan Minarez was fired in August after just one month on the job, reportedly due to clashes with HHS Secretary Kennedy over vaccine policy. Funding cuts have also affected CDC's Foodborne Diseases Active Surveillance Network, or FoodNet surveillance program, which in August slashed the number of foodborne pathogens monitored under the program from 8 to 2. So a lot of changes happening at the CDC and other federal agencies, ongoing and currently.

[B]

Yeah, I looked up, I was kind of going around a.

[A]

I don't remember.

[B]

What my initial search was, but it got me to a CIDREP page, an article chaos following mass Firings and rehirings. And there were folks on there who were basically saying that it's somewhat like being in an abusive relationship. I feel so badly for all these folks. You know, it just can't be easy. And then add the, the mash, you know, the, the, the, the shooting. And I, I can't even imagine. I can't even imagine. So we sending a big love out to all you guys and hang in there. We need you so much.

[D]

So, yeah, it's a, it's a hectic time and we're living in a time.

[A]

It's.

[D]

Anyway, it's a hectic time at this point. And I hope that this is not an evergreen story, a term I learned from Stacy not long ago. And if you're listening long in the future, from October 2025, somewhere way beyond that, I hope this story sounds odd and like, what are they talking about? Why was that happening? So this could go away pretty soon.

[C]

Well, we can only hope.

[B]

I have a feeling that we are living in rather historic times, though, Papa. So. Well, if anybody tells the story, if it hasn't been, you know, redacted.

[C]

Right.

[B]

It might just be redacted. So.

[C]

Okay. So. Moving to some legislative developments, the International association of Color Manufacturers, or the iacm, has filed a lawsuit with the US District Court for Southern West Virginia, arguing that the state's new law banning foods containing any one of seven artificial food colors and two additives is unconstitutional. IACM argues that the law doesn't provide a scientific basis that the targeted colorants are unsafe, therefore violating. Violating equal protection guarantees under the US and state constitutions. The lawsuit also alleges that the law is so vague and ambiguous that it violates constitutional due process protections and that it operates as an unconstitutional bill of attainder as it singles out the targeted color additives for prohibition and criminal penalties without providing their manufacturers any opportunity to demonstrate that they're not harmful. IACM says that if the law is allowed to be enforced, its members will suffer irreparable harm both economically and through the deprivations of their constitutional protections. The artificial food colorings and additives banned under the West Virginia law starting in January 2028, include red dye 3, red dye 40, yellow dye 5, yellow dye 6, blue dyes 1 and 2, and green dye 3, as well as butylated hydroxyanisol and propylparaben. So in its lawsuit, IACM cited the FDA's determinations that the seven food dyes are safe for use following a thorough review and testing process as required by the 1960 Color Additives Amendments law. On the other hand, under The MAHA agenda. FDA has turned against synthetic food colorants, announcing in April its intent to coerce industry into abandoning their use. California was the first state to pass any state food additive ban, which included Red Dye 3 with the October 2023 California Food Safety Act. FDA also revoked its food use authorization for Red Dye 3 in January 2025, just before the end of the Biden administration, although the agency did say at the time that the available scientific evidence still points to the safety of Red Dye 3 as a food additive.

[D]

So I find this to be really a fascinating lawsuit. I mean, I think this is going to be one to watch for a couple of reasons. Number one is they're saying that the ban is unconstitutional and they're su. Federal court. So I'm not trying to play lawyer here, but they're purposely suing in federal court, saying that it's unconstitutional, which means this would have the potential to move up into higher federal courts or the Supreme Court, in which, in case it could have more effect outside of West Virginia. So I really wonder about that. Number two is it, ha, they say that it has no scientific basis, the reason why they pass the law. And in fact, IACM calls it a pseudo scientific fading, which means that IACM will have to present evidence in court that they believe will prove no scientific evidence, no scientific basis or evidence, and if accepted by the court, will resonate across the country. Because I remember when we were talking about California's ban, they had said that they looked at European standards, not necessarily any other evidence or scientific evidence. They just said essentially my words, that this is what Europe does. But I don't remember in the, in the legislative notes being any other scientific facts being presented forward. This one's going to pull all those out and where it winds up, who knows? But it will tend to get all that data in the public again and talked about, and it could affect all these other states. The other thing and we talked about the little this before we were recording is California, New York, Illinois, Utah, all have passed similar laws. There's 11 states that have legislation. But for some reason, IACM, I don't claim to understand this, but for some reason IACM decided to pick West Virginia. They're maybe picking that court on purpose, I don't know, but that's what jumps out to me.

[B]

Well, I think we've got a lot of other stories that are going to kind of point back and forth to some of these same issues, but, you know, some of these quaint concepts, these constitutional due process, you know, things like that. Yeah. So they're approximately, not approximately. According to Lawfare, there are 227 cases that the administration is currently involved in. So we'll just add this to the pile. This goes, you know, federal. It's not against the administration, but we get that. You get the idea. There's a lot going on here. You know, I highlighted too its intent to coerce industry into abandoning which. These are tough concepts. I like our lawmaking and science based. Our subject is science based solutions for food safety quality professionals worldwide. So science based and going through processes and things like that, it's good for industry, certainly it's good for business, it's good for agencies. We all know that everything was a little slow, which is why California and these other states started all moving in their own directions. But it did remind me as well that this week in Food Fix, Helena Bottmler EVIC was reporting on a new formation of the Americans for Ingredient Transparency Group. And they are. I want to get this right. So it's a 501c3 nonprofit backed by leading trade associations and food companies, including consumer brands, American Beverage association and so on. And they want to preempt the states and get federal ruling on this across the board. Not just on this, but I think on all of it. There that's complicated. So, I mean, there's a lot in the air. We could spend all day talking about this. So a lot of moving parts and a lot of tension even within MAGA and Maha and all of these things and, you know, strange bedfellows, if you will, and people with a lot of different objectives and, and, and yeah, so a lot to play out here. It's a lot of balls in the air.

[D]

It's interesting you said that about a move to get it out of the states because of course the manufacturers, if they go through, want some homogeneity across the states, not some sort of patchwork quilt that they're trying to.

[B]

Yeah. Uniform national standard. Yeah, right.

[D]

But if you do this in the way, again, the way this lawsuit looks to me, to my uneducated legal mind, the way it looks to me is that they're trying to do exactly that, get this up to a federal level and settle it there for all the states.

[B]

Yeah. Which is kind of, you know, if we go back to the beginning of or the end of last year, you know, when FDA decided, you know, they were going to start moving on these things. Right. And, and do the rulemaking and do all the, the sort of more standard process. Right. But that was moved and by the states who were Tired of waiting, you know, so there's a. I mean, a lot of reasons for these tensions. So, you know, anyway, watch this space.

[C]

Yeah. So in speaking of, we mentioned California's moves to clean up its food supply. So the state recently passed Assembly Bill 1264, also known as the Real Food Healthy Kids Act. So this first of its kind U.S. legislation establishes a legal definition for ultra processed foods, or upfs, and directs the state Department of Public Health with identifying and phasing out the most harmful UPFS from California schools by 2035. Now, the MAHA Commission has already publicized its intent to construct a standardized definition of UPFS to form a precedent for regulatory action regarding UPFS in the food supply as outlined in both the MAHA report and the MAHA strategy. And as we've discussed, FDA and USDA have issued a joint request for information in July to define and address the risks of UPFs. But with the passage of the Real Food Healthy Kids Act, California basically went hold my beer and established a statutory definition of UPFS way before the federal government or the MAHA Commission got there. So what is that definition? The California act defines UPFS as those high in saturated fat, sodium and added sugar or non sugar sweetener and containing one or more of certain additives including artificial dyes, flavors, sweeteners, emulsifiers and thickening agents. Raw agricultural products, minimally processed foods and pasteurized milk are exempt from the definition of UPFs. So California state scientists will determine whether a product should be phased out of schools based on certain factors. These factors include whether the product includes additives that are banned, restricted or subject to warnings in other jurisdictions, whether the product or its ingredients are linked to cancer, cardiovascular disease, metabolic disease, developmental harms, reproductive harms, obesity, type 2 diabetes or other health problems whether the product or ingredients in the product contribute to food addiction, whether the food meets the FDA's definition for healthy, and whether the food is a UPF due to a common natural additive. So the Real Food Healthy Kids act was introduced by assembly member Jesse Gabriel, who also led two other precedent setting additives bans. We mentioned the California Food Safety act earlier and also the California School Food Safety Act. So since the passage of the California Food safety act in 2023, a wave of state level food additives regulations have been introduced or passed. And the MAHA movement has definitely piggybacked on this momentum.

[D]

Well, that's going to be a lot of different definitions because the FDA is going to go forward. California has theirs, WHO and FAO and other international organizations have theirs. It's going to be hard to Sort them out. But I think this is one of those things where people are going to say, I'm not sure what meets the definition, but I know it when I see it.

[B]

And I guess when you get into kids, that's a whole thing. But I mean, there's also, like, don't we get to decide what we eat? So there's a. Again, there's still a lot of tension there. Right. I think we use kind of the smoking analogy in a recent episode. Right. But I don't think, you know, if we've identified something as harmful that we would start kids out, you know, you know, we don't hand them a pack of Marlboro and they get to. To school. So I don't know. I don't know. These are. These are tough, tough questions, and I think it's going to go on and on.

[D]

What's the old definition about cigarettes that came out of some of those lawsuits? You know, harmful when used as intended. That's what they called it in the, in the, in some of the court things. But I, I would. I'm kind of talking off the cuff here, but I would say that one of the things about something that's. That's definitely harmful when used as intended is a pretty easy one. The rest of these strikes me as the kind of thing that's going happen where once you put the definition together and you start filtering all the different foods through it, we're going to find some that aren't caught that probably everybody agrees should have been caught. You're going to find a few that got caught. You're going to go, wait a second. We need to. We need to change this a little bit, because we're going to find things that maybe meet these definitions but probably aren't that bad.

[B]

Well, and, you know, I always tie it back to socioeconomic factors as well. You know, these foods, better foods, tend to take. To cost more.

[C]

Right.

[B]

And take more time to prepare and so on and so forth. And, you know, it's. It's not always easy. And then that food and leads to food addiction. That one also caught my attention, too. It's like, well, yeah, it's kind of when you're used to being sated in certain ways, then all of a sudden, you know, try and get back to that, you know, on carrots, you know, you're not gonna. That's a tough one.

[D]

And I'll also foreshadow a little bit. We're going to talk about a one health initiative in a minute. Adrian's going to Talk in the news. But the other thing about this is looking at it holistically, you could say that let's say white sugar is something that will meet this definition and should be taken out. Okay. What if you're having a teaspoon a day versus 5 cups a day? Teaspoon a day is probably not going to hurt anything. It's not going to be harmful. If it's the main part of your diet that probably needs to change. So I think it has to go in terms of the entire diet as well.

[C]

Yeah, I was reading this great article the other day, and it was about the history of kind of what we would consider ultra processed foods and how they really became popularized. Food companies started manufacturing them kind of after World War II when, because there was a lot of food innovations that were made for, for the military and things like chocolate bars that didn't melt or foods that wouldn't spoil, that could be in solid packaging and things like this that could be at the bottom of a rucksack and not get smushed or squeezed or leak or anything like that. Anyway, some of these food innovations to keep the shelf life of foods really extended and to make them easily packaged and convenient and easy to eat got translated into, hey, these are great, let's do this as a convenient and affordable option. Meal options for families. So you started seeing things like the rise of TV dinners, for example, so frozen dinners, things like jello and easy to make, like meat in a can type of easy things to be able to serve. And so these were really heavily marketed and hyped up in ads especially targeted toward women, like, hey, you can prepare these foods really simply and easily for your family. You should be doing this. And so a lot of these foods, you know, the nutritional content was maybe not quite as good as what you might see with whole foods. People were, you know, going to the market every day, bringing home fresh food, preparing, you know, spending hours preparing a whole meal for the family. And so when these foods became really popularized after the war and especially really rose to popularity in like the 60s and 70s, from that time on, we started to see the incidence of Things like type 2 diabetes and cholesterol problems and all these other health problems that, you know, people are associating with UPFs now rise exponentially. And so it's really, it was just really interesting review of kind of not only the timeline and momentum behind the rise of these types of quick, easy and ultra processed foods, but also the coincidence of the public health data showing that diets were maybe not as good as they were before. And so you might say there could be a link there. So that was in the New York Times, the morning newsletter from Monday, October 20th. It was an article by Alice Callahan, who's a Times Report porter with a PhD in nutrition. So that was the story for the morning newsletter on October 20th. It was really interesting. So if you have access to that newsletter, might want to go back and take a look.

[B]

That's great. Yeah.

[C]

Okay. And so let's move to something else now. Cross Sectoral Approaches to Ensuring Food Safety so the Reagan Udall foundation recently released a report outlining strategies to enhance coordination in response to public health incidents, including food safety threats. Motivated by growing threats at the intersection of human, animal and environmental health, the report, which was commissioned by fda, identifies gaps and proposes solutions to improve preparedness and response across public health, agriculture and regulatory domains. Recent events, such as the H5N1 avian flu outbreak, underscore the need for integrated responses. These incidents reveal how upstream actions in one sector such as animal health, can have downstream consequences for food safety and human health. Effective control measures are needed to limit contamination and protect public health, but fragmented regulatory frameworks and inconsistent communication across agencies can hinder timely and coordinated action. Stakeholder interviews and roundtable discussions revealed several barriers to effective cross sector responses, including weakened stakeholder confidence, regulatory misalignment, data sharing gaps and lack of clear messaging and trusted communication channels which can slow industry response. The report also outlines solutions to strengthen cross sectoral coordination before, during and after public health incidents. The strategies include clarifying regulatory authorities and coordination protocols for testing, quarantine and communication engaging sector specific stakeholders to inform response strategies and real time information sharing optimizing resources and preparedness through funding, MOUs and holding joint exercises and simulations strengthening communication frameworks for cross agency messaging and public messaging improving surveillance and data systems to prioritize security and transparency and to align surveillance goals with industry partners and frontline workers and building adaptive response structures including the implementation of a unified incident command system with clear leadership roles and establishing flexible frameworks that integrate new stakeholders and regions. So by institutionalizing these strategies, FDA and its partners may be better prepared to protect the food supply and public and animal health.

[D]

When I first read this, and if you listen to the way that Adrian just listed off those goals, I found it hard to put my finger on exactly what they were talking about. But as I read through the paper a little bit more, one of the things that they did was put together stakeholders of people that would know and one of the people that was one of the Stakeholders was Robert Califf from the fda, formerly FDA administrator, who we know. And there was another number of other people, including a professor from Cornell, a number of ex fis and FDA CFSAN people. So it was the right kind of group to get together. And what they were looking at was how do we. How do we become more flexible in our responses and how do we look at everything from a food safety, human health, animal health, and environmental health and safety. One of the things that they said that really jumped out to me a little bit was in an outbreak investigation, you may move, someone needs to take the lead. So they say, we're going to. We're going to game this out as we go around the tables with the people involved and who should take the lead on this one, because what's the key issue? And then they also said, but the key issue may change. So let's say that's an outbreak and someone from FDA or CDC or USDA are looking at it because it's mainly resulting in food or resulting from food. And it turns out that it's really an animal health issue that's working its way down. Okay. Someone from the animal side would then take over and lead that investigation because they're going to be more experts. It may be an environmental thing like what we've seen with irrigation water and leafy greens or something like that, in which case maybe somebody from the EPA who knows more about water issues would take the lead and they talk about it being more flexible as opposed to saying this is a such and such issue because of the way the regulations work. So we're on this and everybody else stay away. I don't think that happens. But that's kind of what they were saying, is the organization needs to be more flexible. And then they went with people on these roundtables that have been involved with this and knew this, and so it looked like they had the right people. When you read at them with that background and you go through the goals, it's a little easier to diagnose from my view.

[B]

Well, I'm glad you found. I was looking before we got on and trying to find who the stakeholder group were. So I'm glad that you found that in there. That makes me feel a bit better. I hope, first of all, that if they do institutionalize these things, I think that given the background that we've all just been discussing about things that are going on and the mass firings in so many agencies, you just get the feeling that we only see what we see, which isn't a lot I think that there's a lot that's just opaque to us, people who are not inside these rooms in these departments, as far as where the gaps are and what gaps have been created. And we've seen over and over again that gaps, dangerous gaps, have been created in some departments that maybe we still haven't identified. So I hope that they do test because our responses to outbreaks and run through some and identify potential gaps and that we don't have to learn this in real time, that there are serious, serious gaps that will prevent us from protecting public health in a timely fashion. So that's all I have.

[C]

Okay, so before we go today, we want to tell you about the successful phase 1 clinical trials of a new vaccine targeting both non typhoidal Salmonella infections and typhoid fever caused by Salmonella typhi. The trivalent Salmonella conjugate vaccine, or the tscv, is designed using sugar molecules taken from Salmonella typhi bacteria and from two common serotypes of non typhoidal Salmone and Terrica, which are among the leading causes of foodborne illness outbreaks. Linked to contaminated poultry eggs and produce. The sugar molecules are then linked to proteins that enhance the body's immune recognition. In the randomized placebo controlled trial led by researchers at the University of Maryland school of medicine, 22 healthy adults received either a low or high dose of the TSCV or a placebo. The vaccine was well tolerated and all vaccinated participants developed strong immune responses to the three targeted Salmonella strains while placebo recipients did not. Some trial participants showed pre existing Salmonella antibodies suggesting prior exposure through foodborne sources which may enhance vaccine induced immunity. Researchers plan to advance to further trials, including studies in young children, which is the population most vulnerable to typhoid and non typhoidal Salmonella enterica infections.

[B]

When I was reading this through I was like, sugar gets a reprieve. I know it's not the same thing.

[D]

I get the geek out a little bit here. I found this one fascinating because originally the research was designed to develop a vaccine for sub Saharan Africa, where typhus and those kind of infections are a major cause of death, mainly because of HIV malnutrition, lack of sanitation, lack of clean water. So it's really an issue where it's one of the leading causes of death. So their first thought is to apply it to sub Saharan Africa, which is probably where it'll go first, unlikely to become something that is a universal widespread immunization. But what they did find is for rapid response in outbreaks, particularly if you had a drug resistant salmonella, you can get the vaccine, it'll have an effect and you may be able to recover from a drug resistant salmonella faster than you would without being able to have antibiotics available. So this could quell an outbreak from a medical standpoint pretty quickly. It won't be something that we go to the drugstore and get a vaccine, but it will be something in a major outbreak, could be used quickly as a, as a place to stop the disease in people.

[B]

Interesting. Okay, well, thank you both so much for all the great comments and stories that we've curated here. And as always, there are links to all of the articles that we've referenced in our show notes. And if you don't already, we invite you to follow us on our social channels, LinkedIn X, Facebook and Instagram. Just search for Food Safety magazine. And then of course, to take a deep dive into all the great content that we offer, Visit our website, food-safety.com and now it's time for Adrian's interview with Doctors John Spink and Roy Fenoff. Dr. John Spink is the director and lead instructor for the Food Fraud Prevention Academy as well as an assistant professor in the Department of Supply Chain Management in the College of Business at Michigan State University. His food fraud prevention research focuses on policy and strategy to understand and prevent supply chain disruptions and to implement procurement best practices. He's widely published in leading academic journals and Food Safety magazine and has helped lead national and global regulatory standards activity. More recently, his teaching and research have expanded to supply chain disruption management and procurement best practices. Dr. Roy Fenoff is an associate professor in the Department of Criminal justice at the Military College of South Carolina, the Citadel. He's also a forensic handwriting and document examiner and an expert in forgery detection. Dr. Fenoff specializes in forgery and document fraud, food fraud and protection, and transnational crime. And now with no ado, we will get right to their discussion.

[C]

So today's topic is a sometimes overlooked but incredibly important one, Food fraud and why and how to prevent it in your supply chain and your products. And I want to welcome to the podcast Roy, you haven't been here before. Thank you so much for joining us and also welcome back to the podcast, John. I know you've been one of our star guests over the years, so it's great to have you both with me today.

[A]

Thank you. Yeah, it's always great to get back, you know, and we always learn something new. Everything that we've done, every single activity and report that we've Done has come from someone asking a question. Sometimes it's just in passing, like, I wonder about this, but a lot of times it's some real problems. So we listen to you and it's important what we're talking about today, that if you've got some feedback, contact us because we want to know what's going on. And let's keep the dialogue going.

[C]

Absolutely, yeah.

[E]

Thanks for having me. I would say that we've been doing this food fraud stuff for quite a while now. We've done several workshops at the Food Safety Summit. And what's fascinating is that today, despite all the technology and all the regulations that we have to combat this stuff, it's still more sophisticated and global than it's ever been. And that's why a lot of the work that we're doing on prevention is so critical.

[C]

Absolutely. And I guess that leads perfectly into my first question for you two. So you two co lead a recurring workshop and a certificate course for our annual Food Safety Summit on food fraud prevention. So I guess my first question for y' all is why is this topic such an urgent and misunderstood issue in the food industry supply chain?

[A]

Well, you know, great, great questions. And we get that all the time. So first off, Food Safety Summit's been a great venue for us, is very. It seems like it's the business side of food safety people that are, in the sense of, you know, look at how businesses justify what they do and adjust to meet the business needs. That's been perfect for us when we're talking about food fraud prevention, because a lot of times people don't really even know that fraud's occurring in their supply chain, but it can impact their business significantly. And very early on, places like this, we were talking about it in presentations. Some of my very first presentations were back. I don't know even the year then, but to start to look at it. And the key is that it's not a traditional food safety issue because you think about microbes. And this is something that comes in more from outside. So there's a lot of things that do constantly change.

[C]

And so where would you say that food fraud intersects with food safety? Then?

[A]

Again, a great question as well, early on for me. Well, Roy and I were first met in the school of Criminal justice at Michigan State, working together more on document fraud. And we started talking a lot about food and food issues. And along the way from working in counterfeiting is really getting involved with the food industry. And it was around the time of melamine and then horse meat and the Key, there was. It was the board, the board of the Global Food Safety Initiative. And there were people that were worried about this for their company. And then they're also leading gfsi. And at that point they were thinking about food fraud, seeing these major problems. And the key is that food fraud is a potential source, a root cause of a food safety incident. And GFSI and HACCP are quality management systems to look for not just the top 10, but any root causes. So food fraud was then included in the food safety certifications requirements because it is a root cause, and that's why it's a real great fit here. Food Safety Summit.

[E]

Yeah. So that, you know, it's. John. You know, I agree with John on that. It is so urgent because it's not just an economic issue. It's also a safety and trust issue. And I think that's where some of the misunderstandings come in, is that, you know, we know that, you know, this is a problem we got to deal with. But we underestimate how deeply embedded or how adaptive and how sophisticated food fraud has become and how food fraudsters are able to adjust on the fly. So when we think about food, how is food safety and food fraud intersect? Well, a lot of people assume that it's mostly an economic issue, like we're cheating the system for profit or something. But in reality, it has direct consequences for food safety. And so if you think about it for a moment, what happens when someone deliberately substitutes, dilutes something or mislabel something, fish sold under the wrong name? At first glance, you know, that might appear to be an honesty issue or some kind of financial loss for a company, but the danger actually comes from, well, what is actually being added, what is actually being taken away, what is actually being hidden. And that is when those substitutions or dilutions take place that, you know, toxins or chemicals or other things can be added to the product that consumers don't expect to be there and don't know how to avoid it. So, you know, probably one of the most classic examples of this, or famous examples of this would be the melamine and milk in China scandal, where a fraudulent additive was added to fake the protein content in milk and it sickened hundreds of thousands of people. I think six. There were six deaths or six reported deaths. So it could have been higher than that. But. So the interaction between food fraud and food safety is. You can think of it this way. Whenever the integrity of the food is compromised, you create an uncertainty about what's really in it. And uncertainty is the enemy of food safety. Right. Because if you can't trust the label, then a consumer can't make safe decisions as a consumer or even as a regulator. And so that's why food fraud is. Isn't just about protecting markets or protecting your brand reputation. It's also about protecting consumer health. And tackling that requires both food fraud prevention strategies and traditional food safety systems.

[C]

Yeah, I think you brought up a lot. You both brought up a lot of good points. And certainly there are many dimensions or aspects to food fraud. Like, Roy, you said economic. And of course, it's a consumer trust issue, and we know that it can have a lot of quality impacts. But. But as we've seen in many cases, there are very real food safety issues with adulteration. You know, I mean, take for example, the cinnamon applesauce incident that we saw in the US in the past couple years, where lead was used, you know, to adulterate. Cinnamon, I believe, from Ecuador was the. Was the supply source. And, you know, that caused lead poisoning in many children. This is like a children's food, you know, so things like that. And then, of course, you know, there's always the risk of allergen reactions if there's any kind of allergen that's involved with the adulteration. So really good points. And I guess this kind of leads into my next question about some of the most common opportunities for food fraud that we see today. And, you know, like, where in the supply chain do you typically see fraudsters operating?

[A]

Yeah, but that's a great question. And it also brings up the idea of what's the urgency? So when there's a food fraud incident, then there gets to be a lot more focus on food fraud. And then people kind of have other issues that keep coming up, such as food safety incident. What we do see is that kind of the nature of the global supply chain is product moving faster, farther around the world. Definitely challenges of taxes, tariffs from one region to another, disruptions. Think about all the sunflower production that's not being conducted in Ukraine or Western Russia. So we see this ebb and flow. And right now we're starting to see a lot more companies looking very closely at fraudulent product in their supply chain and also other more broadly fraudulent activities. Looking at business, you know, business challenges. And even board of directors are really asking companies the inherent nature of the variability of their business or variance. So we see this cycle coming here and there. So. So we feel like it's now in like the next six months, which feeding into Food Safety Summit in May is where Companies are going to be asked by their customers to really look more closely at this. But they're also, the board of directors is going to be looking at that as well. Because there are that for. It's one thing if you find it to be just economic harm or a mislabeling, but these have true absolute food safety issues and things. We need to look at it through a food fraud lens because the type of food safety incidents are food fraud related. There have that bit, like you said, of contaminated tanks that are holding product contaminated equipment, water used to clean out barrels before putting product in. And that's not going to show up in traditional haccp. Just looking inside a facility.

[C]

Yeah, great points. Roy, did you want to add.

[B]

Yeah, that.

[E]

No. This is a really important question because, you know, a lot of what we do is based on the criminology and you know, in evaluating and looking at the complete supply chain from farm to fork, as they say. And it's, it's, you know, you have to look at it from the fraudster's perspective. So you know, they're looking at where are the weak points in a supply chain. And so as you're doing an assessment of your own supply chain, you should be thinking that way. Where are weak points? And that typically is going to be where oversight is thin, where products are more complex. So something like olive oil, for example, where you have multiple sourcing points, it could be where you have, where profit margins are very high. So there's an economic incentive for someone to do something. So one of the biggest opportunities is probably at the ingredient level, maybe where foods are being processed and grounds up because it becomes very hard to verify or authenticate just by looking at it. And that's why things like saffron or turmeric or cumin are among some of the most frequently adulterated foods is for that reason. There's others too. So when you look at specific products like olive oil or seafood, you know, that has a very long and international supply chain where you have a lot of middlemen. Honey faces similar problems. All of that kind of plays into where those weak points are going to come together and there's going to be vulnerabilities. Here's another big one. Fraudsters also exploit documentation and labeling. And so paperwork can be forged far more easily than food itself. So fraudulent country of origin claims or organic labels are very common to be fraudulent, counterfeited in some way, because if the fraud's buried in the paperwork, it can slip through inspections. So you know where in a supply chain, well, you want to look at where there's high value, hard to authenticate and globally traded products. That typically is where the opportunities are going to be. And usually that's going to be upstream in the supply chain.

[C]

You know, this kind of leads me to another question. You know, we're talking about the global nature of the supply chain and you know, how we want to get things around the world faster is another opportunity for food fraud. Could food fraud arise more easily when there are supply chain disruptions such as something major we see saw with the COVID pandemic or even smaller disruptions that are tied to specific events? Is that some, is there a correlation there?

[A]

Absolutely. And actually it's about in another week or two I, I cover supply chain disruptions in my introduction to supply chain class. One thing we look at is, is there is, there's an uncertainty, there's an urgency and there's emergency responses and that's where it can the fraudsters lay in wait and then exploit those. So let's say a company is frequently we'll do a vulnerability assessment, food fraud vulnerability assessment for a company, and we'll cover different areas and we'll say, well what about spot purchases or emergency? And they say oh no, we don't do spot purchases. I said, you've never ever run out of product and need to go, oh well, we barely do that. And they think, oh yeah, you're right. So that's. In those emergencies, people are taking extra steps to be great at helping the supply chains to stay, to stay operating. But at that point then you do things that are outside the norm and that gets back to food safety and haccibas having standard operating procedure follow it and confirm you followed it. And to be aware of when you do deviate. And that's probably some super high percentage of food safety incidents occur when something does just go out of the normal standard operating procedures.

[C]

Okay, interesting. And so in your course, you teach attendees at the summit about different ways to check for catch and trace food fraud. Can you tell us a little bit about these methods?

[A]

Yeah. So one thing that was really tough with food fraud is at the beginning to do the assessments is that there was really hardly any information. And it's very different when you have a very relative to food safety incidents or regular quality incidents, we have exponentially fewer incidents. It's harder to study. And they're also a human adversary. They're forcing their hand. It's not something like a, like a chemical reaction will occur the same way every time with the right pressure, temperature and Components. And so the fraudsters act differently. So we had to shift from risk, you know, assessing that risk and look at the probability to vulnerabilities. And that sounded like was almost witchcraft where we just made it up. But that's actually really prevalent in more general business risks and enterprise risk management. The way that companies at the board level are operating, there's such big risks, they're really vulnerabilities. So we shifted to the vulnerabilities and then we took those into courses and then now do that, you know, throughout things like the workshop to help people through it. Almost the, the biggest thing that we do is help people do it, feel like they're doing less because the very first time it's like going to your primary care doctor and they just do a once over on you. They're not checking out what type of cancer you have or if you have cancer, they're looking for those moles or something that's odd to send you to a specialist. These first initial screenings are just that, to look at where there might be a need to go deeper. And then when you do find something deeper, you put some sometimes extremely robust, extremely scientific programs in place to detect and determine.

[C]

And so in line with this, food fraud vulnerability assessments are a requirement for many food safety certifications. But they're also, you know, just part of doing good business and ensuring food safety. So, and you alluded to this before, but what are some of the elements of a comprehensive food fraud vulnerability assessment?

[A]

Yeah, well, and the key is that for GFSI compliance, doing a food fraud vulnerability assessment on the entire product line is a requirement. So that's, that's clear in GFSI for the, and the GFSI is adopted through things like FSSC22000, IFS, SQF, BRCGs and others. But then you're right, for a business, it's just managing these inherent risks. And if it's public company in the US that would fall under Sarbanes Oxley, whether people realize it or not. Now international companies, non US or private, still have some board level risk assessment. But the key is that the business, from the, from the board of directors to the C suite to the business, they need to understand the inherent variability in their business where there are vulnerable vulnerabilities and system weaknesses and then assess them. You don't prevent every single thing, but you have to have your eyes open for those vulnerabilities and then be aware if something does change that then you can focus. And that's what we do with people, is we Start to look at this once a year to do a complete review of their entire products late. And then maybe Ukraine, Russia has an impact, maybe something else is an impact.

[C]

And I guess a question for you, Roy, would be like, where do you see documentation fitting into the vulnerability?

[E]

Well, I see it as something that needs to be done because it's a facilitator. So, you know, computers are crime facilitators. So documents are one form of crime facilitator. Corruption would be a crime facilitator. So the fraudsters are going to use documentation at every step of the process to get the product moved to wherever they need and sold and accepted as it is. So pretty much when you're doing a vulnerability assessment, looking at your products, you should also be looking at your documents, what documents are you receiving and so on to be able to do that, to determine where the vulnerabilities might be with those.

[C]

Great. And so how can our listeners, who are kind of new to the concept of a food fraud vulnerability assessment, get started with this?

[A]

Well, great question of looking at resources and something early on for us as we were talking about it and working with companies on this and then realizing we can't just tell people there's a problem and not tell them anything to do about it. So very early on we had a food fraud think tank from some of the biggest food companies that are at the end of the supply chain and really helped us create online free resources. So all of our courses, the content's free, there's a small administrative fee for a certificate of completion, but anybody that's interested, foodfraudprevention.com is our website. Again, hundreds of pages of free content, backgrounds, primer documents. There's eight of our MOOC massive open online courses, over 50 hours of video in those, you know, very comprehensive. So the thing with that is that, that they can, they can find an easy place to start with a couple of the 5 or 10 minute videos and then then expand as much as they need.

[C]

Yeah, that sounds like a great resource.

[A]

We do that work. We do part of that workshop, the introduction, the vulnerability assessment at the Food Safety Summit. So if people want to go beyond just listening to it on demand themselves, then they couldn't come live as well. As we have a lot of working sessions there too, which again is great for us because we get to hear what's going on in the field and ad to what we do.

[C]

That's fantastic. And so, you know, one of the goals of a vulnerability assessment is to understand your ingredient supply chain and Your end product and you know, understand those things well enough that you can hopefully prevent food fraud from occurring in the first place. So what are some of the areas that companies should focus on when they're trying to achieve this understanding?

[A]

Now again, a great, a great question. And it forced Roy and I to look at it from a very scholarly standpoint. You know, look at the research in the background, how are new topics researched and when there's not a lot of data, when there's no category. Very early on there was no categories for fraud. Now later a lot of different agencies like Rastaf in the UK now have adulteration and fraud as a category. We didn't have any data so we had to start with. What Roy has talked about from the crime side is looking at just where those vulnerabilities are or crime opportunity, more like the chemistry of the crime and then figure out why that occurs. We cannot look at it from the macro high level standpoint. We have to start very low at specific incidents incidents and then we can combine them together to look at something that might be more document or more supply chain mapping and building up.

[E]

Yeah, this, the, you know, the idea of a vulnerability assessment can sound intimidating, you know, and we, you know, it can be, especially if you're a company and you have thousands of products. You know, how do I evaluate each product individually? So if you try, if you approach it that way, then it becomes a little bit overwhelming. So really the first step, and John, you know, just mentioned this is that awareness, you know, really understanding what food fraud is and that it's not only an economic problem, but it's also a food safety and a brand protection issue as well. And then from there you start taking that structured look at your products. But don't overthink it. You know, start small, use existing tools. There's a lot of existing tools out there that'll help you through the process and then focused on your highest risk products first.

[A]

For me, food fraud has, it's been, it's been absolutely like watching Discovery Channel to hang out with Roy. You know, you get, you should hang out and have a couple beers with a criminologist. The story is there have, but that was a key at the very beginning is that, you know, I was struggling with how do we look at this very non traditional risk. It's very different. People hadn't considered it. You know, the, the internal systems aren't set up to look at for a melamine or something document fraud. But then I think from Roy's standpoint in criminology it was, it was much more simple. You know, the dark figure of crime is hard to find, but then, but then also just these inherent vulnerabilities. And Roy, I think you've always reminded me there has to be a motivated offender for crime to occur, correct?

[E]

Yeah, correct. You know, if you're going to have a. There's crime has ingredients, like if you're baking a cake and if you don't have the specific ingredients together, you're not going to get it. Well, the crime is you have to one, have a motivated offender. So even if there is a crime opportunity and there's no motivated offender, then it's not going to happen. But in addition to the motivated offender, you got to have a suitable target it and it's going to be in the absence of a capable guardian or someone who could stop that. And in this sense, place is important. There's a reason why when organized crime groups are moving, like counterfeit products or in this case food around the world, they target certain ports. And those ports are targeted because there's an opportunity built into it that allows them to get power, the product, past the guardians, which would be maybe the customs inspectors, the border agents. And so, you know, it's all about the crime opportunity and being able to identify where the opportunities are, then you can reduce that. And probably one of the biggest ways we know how to do that is by increasing guardianship. So the more eyes you have on a street, if you will, the less likely a crime is going to occur.

[C]

So actually, I'm curious, Roy, so from the perspective of a criminologist, would you say that most food fraud could be categorized as, you know, low risk, high reward? High risk, high reward. Like how, how do you. Or is it situational? Does it depend on the, you know, the ingredient or the product that's being adulterated every time? I mean, what would you, what would you say?

[E]

It's absolutely situational. And in fact, the whole field of crime prevention is based on the fact that, you know, you have to look at specific places and specific products. Some products are going to have, you know, a higher price point, so they're going to be more attractive. You know, why do people bake organics? Right? You have, I used to tell this joke to my students in class. What's the difference between an organic and an inorganic tomato? And they will tell me all of the technical definitions of why is something organic or not? And I say, well, no, actually it's just a sticker sticker, because to a consumer, if it has a Sticker that says organic. That means the tomatoes organic. So all I need to do is go to Amazon.com you know, spend five bucks on a roll of USDA certified organic stickers, and, you know, I can start attaching them. You know, go to Walmart in the morning, buy the, the inorganic tomatoes that are on sale, put the organic stickers on them, go down to Hobby Lobby, make sure you do it on a Saturday. They close on Sundays. Buy one of those little farmer baskets and buy some, put some hay in it, put your tomatoes, go over to Staples, create yourself a sign that says Dr. Fenoff's Organic Farms. And then you can upsell them because of the organics will sell at a much higher price point. But it's very easy to do that. The same thing like when we were just mentioning the ports, right? So some ports will have opportunities built into it. Maybe that's corruption or other factors that'll make it easier for the fraudsters to push product through. So place matters, situations matters, and the product matters too. And so that's why you have to understand your supply chain from the beginning to the end point to know where. Because think of a supply chain as this long line with a bunch of nodes, and each node is a place. Now, there may be points along your supply chain where the nodes are very secure and they're not many opportunities, but then there are other points where there's opportunities built in, and those are the places you really want to focus on and try to identify what the vulnerabilities are and reduce them.

[C]

That's so interesting and I like your examples. I didn't realize it was so easy to get stickers. That doesn't seem like it should be easy to get to put on on fruit like that. So good to know, but okay. So another focus of the course is teaching attendees how to implement a food fraud prevention strategy and management system. So I know you do an exercise for this during the course. So how do attendees respond to the exercise? Exercise. And also, have you received any feedback from folks who have taken these strategies back to their companies and implemented them?

[A]

Yes. So again, a great question. Everything that we do is built off that the food safety management system requirements. First, the first goal is to pass the certification, and then beyond that is protecting the company. So we look at the most basic aspects. And the first and second requirement from GFSI is to have a vulnerability assessment documented. So we do that in part one and then to have a prevention strategy that's documented. The hard part about that is when you're looking At a blank piece of paper, nothing is harder than starting there. So we start with, you know, what are the very core requirements? And there's really, at the very basic level, they're simple. And so we start with that as an outline. We help them fill that in. And then when you look at it from the top down, it starts to get as detailed as they need to be. Someone that does a lot of importing from, say, Canada has a different type of focus area than if they move product from California to Florida. And there's just different, different things that they would have to do. So we start very simple. And if again, if anything is that we help people go lighter at the start, but just get done. And that's the thing, get that first pass done and then move on and make it again as detailed as it needs to be. So we go back to the literature, to the academics and scholarly works and explain and defend that this is the best way to start to work with subject matter expert insight at the very beginning and then go deeper. You can't get all the data because it's. You don't know what to test yet. And so we look at that as a high level. And then it's also. Those concepts are aligned with management systems and governance inside a company. I'm in the business college and these are based on just good business practices. So that even the terms and the categories we use are the same categories that might use in managerial accounting or use at the board level for risk assessments. So we start there and then they go only as deep as they need to go. We have got great feedback because, you know, they can say they're using the method from there, the process, and then they didn't just make it up, they're referring to something else. And Roy and I work hard to create academic articles, publish them, so that there's a peer review refereed type article behind it.

[C]

Yeah, that's great. Oh, go ahead, Roy.

[E]

No, sorry, yeah. In building off what John just said, the other thing is that the workshop and the courses and the exercises we have are not just academic. The attendees leave the course not just with the knowledge they've obtained, but with practical tools that they can actually take back and implement real change within their companies. And we're getting feedback on this, that this is actually what some of the participants are doing. They share success stories with us and so on. So it really is something that you learn, you learn some theoretical aspects of it, but there's a lot of stuff that you take home with you that you can implement and apply immediately.

[A]

Yeah. And it's so fun. Yeah, I guess it is fun. Is that, you know, so someone's there in the audience and they're thinking, oh my gosh, now I have to create this food fraud prevention strategy. How do I start? So we always pick out. Someone said, okay, open a word document, okay? And at the top of it, type my food fraud prevention strategy. Save. They've officially got one started now. That's not where they end. But then they kind of laugh about. That's the thing. As soon as we see someone laugh, then we see that we've got them, they're rolling along, the stress is down. And then, then it's just list of an outline. Who's the executive sponsor, who's on the team, what's the date today? I said, you're doing it right now. And then, you know, what products do you, do you cover? What, what, what standard do you cover? And we just go through these. It seems very informal to them, but it's very accessible because then they're just filling in the blanks. And then in the big picture, we have. We then show them what. Then we go at that point, then we go back and look at the specific detail in the food safety standard again, like a BRCGs look specifically. Now, what we have on PA, does it actually meet what the goal was? And now they go deeper and deeper. So again, the big things, we just get them started and then we make it light. They laugh about it, but then the stress is down and then they do see how it does actually fit.

[C]

And the folks who are, you know, kind of responsible for making these documents, would you say those are folks that are primarily working on quality and safety teams at various size companies?

[A]

Yeah, it really, this builds out. That's one of the problems or one of the biggest challenges is because if you look at inside a company, at the food safety management systems, once they're implemented, they're very, very scientific and they're very operational. Being on the manufacturing floor, it's taking samples, it's doing tests, it's cleaning the right way, things like that. It's very, very, again, scientific and operational. A lot of the food fraud prevention is much more theoretical. It's global supply chain procurement, it's criminology. That's foreign to people. So it's a stock start. They feel like, I can't do this because I have no idea about this field. But they don't have to. We're the ones. That's why Roy's a criminologist at Citadel. I'm a supply chain management professor at Michigan State. We go do that research and put it together to then convert it into. Into steps that are really easy for them at the start. And again they get started, and then once they identify additional vulnerabilities or additional complexities, then they know the question. They know how to go deeper in that one area. And again, two companies could look exactly alike, but just a few little details of their supply chain could lead it to be absolutely, fundamentally different in their vulnerabilities.

[C]

Yeah, well, certainly the two of you bring two different and I think really great perspectives to this course and rounded out really well. And I think what you're talking about, helping people get started with these assessments and management systems and things like that, you know, you're essentially getting them to do their own analysis. And, you know, like you said, you know, they, they're able to get deeper as they go further, even if it feels really basic from the outset. So that, that's a great exercise and way for. To help people get started. So, you know, as we've discussed on this talk today, food fraud is a dynamic and constantly evolving area of criminal opportunity. So I guess my last question for you about both is what makes this work meaningful for you and also what makes it challenging.

[E]

Yeah. So food fraud isn't just a theoretical problem, although criminology, supply chain, we look at the theoretical aspects, we publish journal articles, we read a lot of this stuff. But it's not just a theoretical problem.

[A]

Right.

[E]

As discussed, you know, it puts consumers at risk. It can undermine confidence in the food system. So being able to help companies understand and prevent food fraud means that we're protecting both not only the general public and the consumers, but also the integrity of the supply chain. And that, at least for me, is incredibly rewarding. At the same time, however, it's challenging because as you just pointed out, you know, food fraud is constantly evolving. Fraudsters are creative. They adapt to new regulations, they'll adapt to new testing methods, traceability systems. And as a result, especially with the global supply chains, it's just very complicated. So the challenge is staying one step ahead, always trying to figure out what the next move is going to be. And when we close one loophole, it seems like another one opens up. But that's what keeps the work exciting, too. So it's not only very meaningful, but it's very exciting because there's always a new puzzle to solve. If that doesn't get you excited and up in the morning, then I don't know what will.

[C]

Yeah, And John, what about you?

[A]

Yeah, no, I agree. I think that it's very unique for academics to be both on the extremely theoretical, cutting edge, new knowledge end of things. So again, food fraud, like, like the work we're doing on document fraud, we haven't found anybody that's working in that space. That's absolutely kind of unimaginable for a lot of academics. So we've got this new space, but at the same time it's a challenge because we're trying to, to, you know, figure it out, we're trying to get it published and things like that, of getting the knowledge out there. But then we're working at the other end, which is the practitioners. And so that again, that's very unique for academia to be both at the very end of research, but not only that, but the new knowledge research, but also very, very embedded with, with the companies. So when we start to have some of these questions or maybe we get a challenge about some of that work, we can go right to someone on the front line and say, hey, did you really. Do you really see this problem with this or that? And then we know absolutely without question that that are. That this is actual. We know the exact details of the problem and we can go back and forth. And that's the part that's really, it's very unique for us. And I think that it also, it takes a unique team. You know, I broke Roy a while ago getting him to apply some criminology in different ways, but he's also had me more structured as well.

[C]

Well, that's fantastic. I really appreciate being able to talk with you both about this really important topic. And certainly we look forward to the next iteration of the course at the Food Safety Summit in Rosemont next year, May 11th through the 14th. I think it is possibly I'll double check on those dates. But yeah, so we look forward to having you back. And, and of course it's always really great to talk food fraud with you both. Again, you know, sometimes overlooked or maybe not thought of as often as like the contamination control, but has very real world implications for food safety and quality. So we appreciate you guys sitting down to have this discussion with us.

[E]

Yeah, thanks for having me. I really enjoyed the conversation.

[A]

Yeah, have a great day. Thank you.

[B]

Thanks again to Dr. John Spink and Dr. Roy Fenoff for joining us on the podcast today. And of course, thanks to all of you for listening and you know, we love hearing from you, so please don't hesitate to send us questions or suggestions to podcastood-safety.com. or you can always post us a note on LinkedIn, X, Facebook, or Instagram. We're always happy to get your feedback and to make sure that new and bonus episodes magically appear in your podcast player. I always have to get that right for you, Bob. You know, I gotta get my tone just right.

[D]

It magically has to be magical.

[B]

I gotta work on my magic every episode. All right, so how are you applying that magic to? Just click on that Follow or Subscribe button in the player of your choice and presto, bingo. All the episodes appear. And while you're there, throw some stars our way by rating the podcast, especially if you liked it. It only takes a moment, and it's good for everyone. And that's it for us today. Our next regular episode will post on November 11th. In the meantime, take good care of yourselves and those around you, and we'll talk to you then.