Secretary Rollins Announces New Plan to Bolster Meat and Poultry Safety

(St. Louis, MO, July 15, 2025) – U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Brooke L. Rollins today at the opening of the U.S. Department of Agriculture's (USDA) new, modernized Midwestern Food Safety Laboratory, launched a  comprehensive plan to bolster USDA's efforts to combat foodborne illness. This plan better positions USDA's Food Safety and Inspection Service (FSIS), which is responsible for ensuring meat, poultry, and egg products are safe, wholesome, and properly labeled, to protect the nation's food supply. FSIS will continue to work in close collaboration with partners like the U.S. Food and Drug Administration and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to ensure the safety of the entire food supply chain. 

"President Trump is committed to ensuring American consumers have the safest, most abundant, and affordable food supply in the world. When it comes to food safety, USDA is charting a bold new course in giving consumers confidence their meat, poultry, and egg products meet our best-in-class food safety standards," said Secretary Rollins. "I look forward to continued collaboration across the Trump administration, with states, and with food producers from farm to table, to reduce foodborne illness and protect public health."   

USDA's Plan to Bolster Food Safety 

1. Enhancing Microbiological Testing and Inspection Oversight 

USDA is making continued enhancements to its Listeria testing method to provide quicker results to industry and to detect a broader set of Listeria species. These additional results highlight conditions where Listeria monocytogenes can thrive in facilities producing ready-to-eat (RTE) products and help industry and FSIS identify potential sanitation problems. In 2025, FSIS has tested over 23,000 samples for Listeria, a more than 200 percent increase in samples from 2024. 

To support these enhanced testing efforts, FSIS is opening its new, modernized Midwestern Laboratory in Normandy, Missouri. During President Trump's first term, FSIS collaborated across the Trump administration and with Congressional leaders to secure funding for a 70,000 square foot, state-of-the-art laboratory to replace the current outdated laboratory in St. Louis. This new facility will play a critical role in analyzing verification samples for food borne pathogens and chemical residues and will also support efforts to streamline the FSIS laboratory system. 

FSIS is also mobilizing its resources to perform more robust, in-person Food Safety Assessments (FSAs), prioritizing RTE meat and poultry establishments. In 2025, the agency completed 440 FSAs, a 52 percent increase from the same time period in 2024. These reviews proactively identify and address potential food safety concerns.   

2. Equipping FSIS Inspectors with Updated Training and Tools 

This year, FSIS implemented a new weekly questionnaire for frontline inspectors to collect data on specific Listeria monocytogenes-related risk factors at all RTE establishments. This new tool collects important data to identify developing food safety concerns, allowing FSIS inspectors and their supervisors to take timely action to protect consumers. To date, approximately 53,000 weekly questionnaires with over 840,000 new data points have been collected on these risk factors. 

To complement this, FSIS continues to enhance its instructions and related training for inspectors to help them recognize and elevate problems with an establishment's food safety system. New instructions aid inspectors in recognizing how to look beyond individual noncompliances and determine when an establishment has systemic problems that should be elevated and addressed. Since January, the agency also updated its Listeria-specific training and administered it to over 5,200 frontline inspection personnel. This training will strengthen inspectors' understanding of the regulatory requirements in FSIS' Listeria Rule and how to verify establishments have designed and implemented food safety systems that comply with those requirements.  

3. Charging Ahead to Reduce Salmonella Illnesses 

Secretary Rollins has charged FSIS to find a more effective and achievable approach to address Salmonella in poultry products. FSIS withdrew President Biden's proposed Salmonella Framework in April in light of significant concerns raised by stakeholders about the regulatory burden and costly impacts it would have had on small poultry growers and processors. The Trump administration is pursuing a new, common-sense strategy on Salmonella to protect public health while preventing unnecessary regulatory overreach, which will begin by convening listening sessions with key stakeholders to collaborate on best approaches moving forward. 

4. Strengthening State Partnerships 

States are crucial partners in ensuring a safe and strong food supply and provide a vital service in bringing nutritious, affordable American food products to dinner tables across the country. In May, Secretary Rollins announced an additional $14.5 million in funding to reimburse states for their meat and poultry inspection programs and called on Congress to more sustainably fund these critical programs moving forward. This funding is needed to support more than 1,500 American businesses that rely on state inspection, including small and very small meat and poultry processors. The Secretary also signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the National Association of State Departments of Agriculture in May to improve collaboration between USDA and states moving forward. 

Additionally, this year, FSIS signed updated, comprehensive cooperative agreements with all 29 states that operate state meat and poultry programs. These agreements clarify expectations for oversight and enforcement of food safety laws, provide comprehensive training for inspectors, and ensure regular coordination with FSIS. As part of its enhanced oversight of Talmadge-Aiken (TA) state cooperative programs, FSIS has completed in-person reviews at 77 percent (320 of 414) of TA establishments in the first six months of 2025. 

5. Empowering FSIS Inspectors to Take Action to Drive Compliance 

FSIS is exercising its enforcement authorities and issuing notices of intended enforcement or suspending operations at establishments to address recurring noncompliance and ensure safe food production. The agency has taken 103 enforcement actions in 2025 to protect consumers, an increase of 36 percent over the same period in 2024. Additionally, FSIS has instructed its field supervisors to conduct in-person, follow-up visits when systemic issues are identified during a Food Safety Assessment. Follow-up visits by FSIS field supervisors bolster oversight to ensure an establishment fully addresses issues identified during a Food Safety Assessment and could inform enforcement action by FSIS.