The American Frozen Food Institute (AFFI) is advancing a new approach to enteric virus contamination in frozen berries, shifting the focus from finished-product testing toward real-time supply-chain visibility.

A sizable portion of the U.S. frozen berry supply is imported, often from multiple regions, and moves through a fragmented chain of growers, processors, repackers and distributors before reaching consumers.

As product moves downstream, lots are frequently commingled, creating both traceability challenges and opportunities for accumulated risk. Compounding the issue, many producing regions face environmental and public health conditions that increase the likelihood of contamination. Manual harvesting, water quality issues, sanitation infrastructure and weather events like flooding all can introduce risk.

And unlike some other food safety hazards, enteric viruses are difficult to detect and persist through freezing.

“If you’ve got contamination, guess what? Freezing is not a kill step, it’s going to persist through the course of the shelf life,” said Dr. Sanjay Gummalla, AFFI’s senior vice president of food safety and scientific affairs.

Historically, buyers have relied heavily on finished-product testing as a risk management tool. But that approach is fundamentally limited when it comes to viruses like norovirus or Hepatitis A, the later which was blamed for a frozen strawberry recall in 2023.

“These are the most inadequate tests,” Gummalla said. “We are looking for a needle in a haystack, and you have to sample the entire lot before you can find it, and that’s not feasible.”

Part of the challenge is biological. Unlike bacteria – Salmonella or Listeria – enteric viruses cannot be cultured in the same way. Testing typically detects fragments of viral genetic material, which may or may not indicate the presence of an infectious virus.

That creates uncertainty in both directions — false negatives due to low detection probability and false positives that can trigger costly recalls without clear public health risk. At the same time, testing often occurs after significant resources have already been invested in harvesting, processing and transporting product, amplifying the financial and sustainability impact when issues are identified late.

Supply Chain Wide Approach to Prevention

In response AFFI developed EViews, a data-driven platform designed to shift the industry toward prevention and predictive risk assessment.

“We think of it as an early warning system,” Gummalla said. “This is a whole supply chain approach.”

Rather than relying on a single test result, EViews aggregates data across the supply chain—from farm practices to environmental conditions—to generate a risk score for individual lots.

Downstream buyers can then use that score to make more informed decisions. The system incorporates both self-reported data and external inputs, such as geolocation and weather patterns, to create a more comprehensive picture of risk. For example, heavy precipitation or flooding in a growing region could elevate a lot’s risk profile even if no issues are detected through testing.

The system depends on data sharing and alignment among growers, processors, importers and buyers.

That includes managing complexity introduced by blending and commingling, where multiple lots are combined into a single finished product. EViews is designed to aggregate risk scores from contributing lots into a final assessment.

AFFI has already expanded its framework to include Cyclospora, another pathogen associated with fresh and frozen produce.

About 10 berry suppliers have signed up to participate in EViews, representing nearly 65% of the supply chain, Gummalla said.

Implementation requires financial and operational investment and relies in part on self-reported data — an ongoing point of tension in food safety systems. But for AFFI, the push toward EViews reflects a broader shift in food safety—one that prioritizes visibility, data and prevention over reactive measures.

The stakes are particularly high in frozen fruit, where long shelf life and global sourcing amplify both risk and consequence. Contamination can persist in the marketplace for extended periods, with recalls having significant brand and financial impacts.

At the same time, consumer demand for frozen berries continues to grow, driven by convenience, nutrition and year-round availability. The challenge for experts, Gummalla said, is ensuring the supply chain evolves alongside that demand.

“Consumers demand these products and we just can’t do it without a more global supply chain,” Gummalla said. “We have to create visibility in the supply chain. We have to collect and analyze key data … from farm to fork.”