Its mission is to improve public health and reduce mortality, morbidity, and economic costs associated with foodborne illnesses.
Many state and local offices no longer fund travel for training their food safety inspectors due to budgetary constraints.
In 2009, The Training Institute was established after government, academic, industry, and national food safety groups collaborated, prompted by the melamine incident in 2007.
This training allowed state officials to make decisions about closing fishing areas as well as evaluate the safety of seafood harvested in the Gulf.
[13] The Training Institute received $1 million as designated in a 2010 federal appropriations bill which provides funding for the U.S. Department of Agriculture, U.S. Food and Drug Administration, and related agencies.