Preparing for the Future: Building Capacity for Food Safety Compliance at Farmers` Markets

The objectives of our project are three folds: Objective 1: To Assess microbial quality the differences in the bacterial communities on the food products by metagenomics study, level of foodborne pathogens and prevalence of antimicrobial resistant (AMR) bacteria present in selected food products obtained from farmers' markets in the DelMarVa region; Objective 2: To Investigate the potential paths of the pathogen transmission among these neighboring states; and Objective 3: To Develop and implement three institutional-research-based educational and training modules on safe food production and handling specific to farm producers and farmers' market vendor for FSMA compliance.