When a food product is either defective or potentially harmful, recalling that product — removing it from the market — is the most effective means for protecting the public. This is a responsibility for every segment of the food industry, including food banks and other food assistance programs. Because our guests are often more vulnerable to public health dangers, it is important that we, as a network, remain diligent about protecting their food supply.
Here is the Food Bank’s recall procedure:
- When the Food Bank receives notification of a product recall from the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), or Feeding America, it will remove that product from the shelves within 24 hours;
- The Food Bank will notify by email all programs that received the product of the recall within 24 hours;
- Member programs will remove from their shelves, discontinue use, and dispose of recalled products within one business day of recall notice; and
- Member programs will maintain records of removal and disposal of recalled products.
There are times when recalled product may pass through our Salvage stream. Due to this possibility we provide links in Web Windows online ordering system that give our agencies the ability to access recall information provided by our retail salvage partners and government agencies.
There are other products that we do not distribute that member programs access through other means, such as food drives, retail pick-up, or private donations. We will not have these products listed on our recall list, but will always have links to the USDA and FDA recall websites on the web-windows home page for member programs.
Additional Resources
We strongly encourage member programs to actively monitor the following recall websites to ensure the safety of the products they are providing:
