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<< back to the 1999 archive listing << Dairy, Food and Environmental Sanitation Quotations From Jack, December 1999 No matter how you cut it, Membership in IAMFES has a lot to offer the field
sanitarian One of the groups IAMFES serves is the field sanitarian. Field sanitarians include local dairy field staff and dairy plant quality assurance staff, quality assurance staff in other food processing industries and the retail food industry and state and local government inspectional staff. Field sanitarians have some special needs from our Association. They are looking for practical information on how they can do their job better, information on what new things are happening that could affect them in the future and resource information on new products or information that they can use. IAMFES meets these needs in part through our journal Dairy, Food and Environmental Sanitation and symposia at our Annual Meeting that provide the kinds of information they are looking for. Our Annual Meeting also provides an excellent opportunity to network with many leaders in food safety from around the world. IAMFES publishes brochures and manuals targeted to field sanitarians including "Procedures to Investigate Foodborne Illness," "Procedures to Investigate Waterborne Illness," "Procedures to Investigate Arthropodborne and Rodentborne Illness," "Before Disaster Strikes… a Guide to Food Safety in the Home," and "Food Safety at Temporary Events." Unfortunately, many field sanitarians do not belong to "International" as they feel that we are not meeting their needs. We are always looking for additional ways to reach out to field sanitarians and demonstrate to them the value of belonging to our Association. To better accomplish this we need ideas from our current Members on how we can attract and retain more field sanitarians as members. Are there specific subjects you would like to see covered in DFES articles? Are there symposia topics we can include at future annual meetings? We are looking to expand services on our Web page; which ones can you suggest that would most appeal to the field sanitarian? We have been talking about sponsoring training courses in various parts of the country on topics of interest to field sanitarians. Would you be interested in attending such courses and what topics would you like to see us address? What course formats (e.g., length of course); registration cost, and size of class would appeal to sanitarians? Another way field sanitarians can find IAMFES Membership valuable is by joining one of our committees or professional development groups. These groups are looking for new members and while they usually only meet at the Annual Meeting they have begun to take on projects during the year. They are an excellent way to make contacts with other individuals with similar interests. We have groups in dairy field and plant areas, meat and poultry, seafood, produce, viral and parasitic foodborne agents, retail food and HACCP just to mention a few of the subject areas. No matter how you cut it, Membership in IAMFES has a lot to offer the field sanitarian, we just need to get the word out and tailor our services to ever-changing interests. To this end I ask your help in responding to this article by either contacting David Tharp in our Des Moines office or me with your suggestions on how we can increase our field sanitarian membership. Thanks for your help. |