The Food Modernization Safety Act is seeking to make fresh produce safer, and an ongoing trial in Oregon involving onions was a prime place to start researching.
The Malheur Experiment Station at Oregon State University has been running several trials on E.coli. Director Clint Shock says the local onion industry was a great place to start due to its non-existent history of E.coli reports, especially with the other surrounding industries. Shock says Oregon has been on the forefront of drip irrigation, and that may be a contributing factor. Shock’s team found little results of E.coli in their trials and even went to extremes to find significant counts of bacteria.