December 2/Washington/Marketing Business Weekly -- The International Dairy Foods Association (IDFA) has named Jonathan M. Gardner, a longtime food-safety expert at the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, to fill the position of vice president of regulatory affairs and international standards. In this role, Gardner will direct all aspects of IDFA's Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Points (HACCP) Certification Program, and he will oversee product-safety and quality-control issues, as well as federal and state regulatory affairs. He also will participate in International Dairy Federation committees and the National Conference on Interstate Milk Shipments (NCIMS).

While at FDA, Gardner served for eight years as a consumer safety officer on the Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition (CFSAN) Grade "A" Milk Safety Team. In this position, he focused on regulatory issues involving the Pasteurized Milk Ordinance (PMO) and served on several NCIMS committees, including the Third-Party Certification Pilot Program Committee, the Technical Review Committee and the Heating and Cooling Section Review Committee.

Most recently, Gardner worked in FDA's Division of Human Resource Development as the lead training officer for Grade "A" dairy and aseptic processing courses. He also led courses on environmental sampling, Good Manufacturing Practices (GMPs) for food, food-safety management at retail and veterinary-medicine training.

Before joining FDA, Gardner worked as an environmental health specialist for the Virginia Department of Health, where he served as the liaison between the department and other state and federal agencies involved in food and dairy regulation. He inspected Grade "A" dairy processing facilities and regularly validated the processing equipment for a variety of pasteurization systems.

"Jon brings a wealth of experience to our regulatory and international teams, and we are extremely excited to have him come on board at this critical time," said Clay Hough, IDFA senior group vice president. "I know he will be a valuable resource, both within IDFA and among our member companies, especially those planning to gain HACCP certification."

From the December 20, 2010, Prepared Foods E-dition