The National Center for Food Protection receives $3.8 Million grant

The W.K. Kellogg Foundation awarded a $3.8 million, 3-year grant to the National Center for Food Protection this week.The grant supports the national center’s work advancing food protection and its role facilitating the exchange of information, generating new ideas and accelerating processes that will enhance the safety of the global food supply.”By connecting food safety professionals and scientists, our aim is to influence policies and practices that will advance food protection,” says International Food Protection Training Institute President and COO Stephen Benoit. “We are extremely grateful for the support of the W.K. Kellogg Foundation as its generosity will enable us to make great strides toward realizing our overarching goal of improving public health.”The NCFP will use the grant funds on three intiatives:• training for state and local food protection officials throughout their careers through the International Food Protection Training Institute;• development of new food protection technologies at the Emerging Technology Accelerator; and• the exchange of knowledge and generation of new ideas at a Global Food Protection Symposia.An estimated 76 million illnesses, 325,000 hospitalizations, and 5,000 deaths occur annually in the U.S. due to food pathogens; and about one of every four Americans will develop a food-borne illness each year, says the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.  The NCFP, a catalyst for the advancement of food protection, also is a lynchpin in redevelopment efforts for downtown Battle Creek. Writer: Kathy JenningsSource: Jennifer Dama, National Center for Food Protection