Are YOU a Stakeholder?
The fresh fruits and vegetables you enjoy everyday doesn't get to the store on its own, and there are so many more steps involved than harvesting and consuming. Read on below about the other stakeholders involved in getting you the food you love.
Buyers contract directly with shipping facilities to cool, store, and ship their fresh fruits and vegetables to foodservice and retail distribution centers as well as wholesale markets. Buyers often arrange transportation with carriers and brokers, which means that under FSMA's Sanitary Transportation Rule, they are 'shippers' and are responsible for ensuring FSMA transportation compliance.
Trucking companies are critical in the supply chain. They are the stakeholders who must ensure that their transportation practices do not pose risks to food while it is being transported by their drivers in their trailers. Under FSMA, this requires training, adherence to science-based protocols, and documentation demonstrating compliance in each of these areas.
Transportation brokers intermediaries, the 'middle man', between buyers and carriers. They are contracted with buyers and sometimes shippers to select an appropriate carrier to pick up and deliver fresh produce loads on time and without damage. Once a buyer contracts with a broker, either on a load-by-load basis or for annual contracts in specific lanes, the broker then becomes a 'shipper' under the rule, which places the responsibility for FSMA compliance on them. The buyer provides contractual specifications for the brokers to communicate to carriers loading their freight.
Shippers manage the cooling, storage, and shipping of fresh produce transported in bins and cartons. Their facilities, most often referred to as 'coolers,' must be regularly cleaned and sanitized on a scheduled basis (known as sanitation breaks) by their sanitation teams. They are required to know and implement safe food transportation practices specified by their buying customers.