Pilot Development of a Critical Food Safety Message Visual Communication Tool for Farmers’ Market Vendors
Keywords
Foodborne Illnesses
Farmers' Markets
Educational Tools
Visual-Based Training
How to Cite
Abstract
Farmers’ markets are popular sources of fresh and ready-to-eat foods for consumers in the United States. However, research indicates that food safety practices of vendors and their employees serve as a concern for customers. This pilot study focused on assessing a visual-based, minimal-text educational tool that was disseminated to farmers’ market vendors and employees (n = 27) in Iowa. The tool was evaluated using a post-intervention survey of vendors’ and employees’ knowledge of food safety practices and their attitudes towards the educational tool. The results did not show a statistically significant increase in attitude and knowledge scores of farmers’ market vendors and employees for participants that reported seeing the food safety tool versus those that did not. However, participants did respond favorably to the food safety tool’s informative content and visual format; many indicated an interest in using the tool in their stalls in the future. The results suggest that farmers’ markets vendors and employees feel favorably towards the use of visual tools in the communication and promotion of safe food handling practices.
References
Abel, J., Thomson, J., & Maretzki, A. (1999). Extension’s role with farmers’ markets: Working with farmers, consumers, and communities. Journal of Extension, 37(5). https://archives.joe.org/joe/1999october/a4.php
Chapman, B., MacLaurin, T., & Powell, D. (2011). Food safety infosheets: Design and refinement of a narrative-based training intervention. British Food Journal, 113(2), 160–186. https://doi.org/10.1108/00070701111105286
Creswell, J. W. (2014). Educational research: Planning, conducting, and evaluating quantitative and qualitative research (5th ed). Pearson.
Dworkin, M. S., Panchal, P., & Liu, L. (2012). The CHEF project: Results of a randomized bilingual dual format passive restaurant food handler educational intervention in Chicago. Food Protection Trends, 32(10), 564–573. http://www.foodprotection.org/files/food-protection-trends/Oct-12-Dworkin.pdf
Ellis, J., Arendt, S., Strohbehn, C., Meyer, J., & Paez, P. (2010). Varying influences of motivation factors on employees’ likelihood to perform safe food handling practices because of demographic differences. Journal of Food Protection, 73(11), 2065–2071. https://doi.org/10.4315/0362-028X-73.11.2065
Gwin, L., & Lev, L. (2011). Meat and poultry buy at farmers markets: A survey of shoppers at three markets in Oregon. Journal of Extension, 49(1). https://www.joe.org/joe/2011february/rb4.php
Kline, T. R., Kneen, H., Barrett, E., Kleinschmidt, A., & Doohan, D. (2012). Adapting Extension food safety programing for vegetable growers to accommodate differences in ethnicity, farming scale, and other individual factors. Journal of Extension, 50(1). https://tigerprints.clemson.edu/joe/vol50/iss1/13/
Ko, W.-H. (2013). The relationship among food safety knowledge, attitudes and self-reported HACCP practices in restaurant employees. Food Control, 29(1), 192–197. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.foodcont.2012.05.076
McIntyre, L., Herr, I., Kardan, L., Shyng, S., & Allen, K. (2014). Competencies of those assessing food safety risks of foods for sale at farmers’ markets in British Columbia, Canada. Food Protection Trends, 34(5), 331–348. http://www.foodprotection.org/files/food-protection-trends/Sep-Oct-14-McIntyre.pdf
Painter, J. A., Hoekstra, R. M., Ayers, T., Tauxe, R. V., Braden, C. R., Angulo, F. J., & Griffin, P. M. (2013). Attribution of foodborne illnesses, hospitalizations, and deaths to food commodities by using outbreak data, United States, 1998–2008. Emerging Infectious Diseases, 19(3), 407–415. https://doi.org/10.3201/eid1903.111866
Rajagopal, L. (2012). Use of visuals for food safety education of Spanish-speaking foodservice workers: A case study in Iowa. Journal of Extension, 50(2). https://tigerprints.clemson.edu/joe/vol50/iss2/72/
Roberts, K., Arendt, S., Strohbehn, C., Ellis, J., & Paez, P. (2012). Educating future managers to motivate employees to follow food safety practices. Journal of Foodservice Management & Education, 6(1), 1–8. http://fsmec.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/10/Volume-6-Issue-1.pdf
Scheinberg, J., Radhakrishna, R., & Cutter, C. N. (2013). Food safety knowledge, behavior, and attitudes of vendors of poultry products sold at Pennsylvania farmers’ markets. Journal of Extension, 51(6). https://archives.joe.org/joe/2013december/a4.php
Sirsat, S. A., Gibson, K. E., & Neal, J. A. (2015). Food safety at farmers’ markets: fact or fiction? In S. C. Ricke, J. R. Donaldson, & C. A. Phillips (Eds.), Food Safety (pp. 319–329). Academic Press. https://doi.org/10.1016/B978-0-12-800245-2.00015-0
Tokuç, B., Ekuklu, G., Berberoğlu, U., Bilge, E., & Dedeler, H. (2009). Knowledge, attitudes and self-reported practices of food service staff regarding food hygiene in Edirne, Turkey. Food Control, 20(6), 565–568. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.foodcont.2008.08.013
USDA Agricultural Marketing Service. (2015). 2014 National farmers market manager survey summary. http://www.ams.usda.gov/sites/default/files/media/2014%20Farmers%20Mar
ket%20Managers%20Survey%20Summary%20Report%20final%20July%2024%202015.pdf
United States Public Health Service Food and Drug Administration. (2013). Food code: 2013 Recommendations of the United States Public Health Service Food and Drug Administration. https://www.fda.gov/media/87140/download
Worsfold, D., Worsfold, P. M., & Griffith, C. J. (2004). An assessment of food hygiene and safety at farmers’ markets. International Journal of Environmental Health Research, 14(2), 109–119. https://doi.org/10.1080/0960312042000209507
Young, I., Thaivalappil, A., Reimer, D., & Greig, J. (2017). Food safety at farmers’ markets: A knowledge synthesis of published research. Journal of Food Protection, 80(12), 2033–2047. https://jfoodprotection.org/doi/full/10.4315/0362-028X.JFP-17-193
Zanin, L. M., da Cunha, D. T., Stedefeldt, E., & Capriles, V. D. (2015). Seafood safety: Knowledge, attitudes, self-reported practices, and risk perceptions of seafood workers. Food Research International, 67, 19–24. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.foodres.2014.10.013
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License.