The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has determined that Florida-grown tomatoes are not involved in the 17-state salmonella outbreak, and have placed them on the "safe to eat" list, state Agriculture Commissioner Charles Bronson said today.

The FDA's Website will reflect the change tonight.

"I was confident Florida was not the problem and was not the source of the salmonella outbreak impacting other states," Bronson said in a statement. "Florida tomato growers have one of the most stringent tomato production programs in the nation."

Florida joins a list of 16 states and countries cleared of any connection to the outbreak that began in mid-April. The FDA has warned consumers not to eat raw red plum, red Roma and red round tomatoes unless they are on the "safe list."

State and industry officials have been working with the FDA to have Florida tomatoes cleared.

The outbreak of the Salmonella Saintpaul strain of the salmonella bacterium has now spread to 17 states, with 167 confirmed cases of the illness, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said. One death, that of a 67-year-old cancer patient in Texas, has now been linked by health officials to the salmonella outbreak, the Associated Press reported.

After reviewing Florida's safety initiative, the timing of the illness outbreak and the tomato harvesting, FDA added Florida to the "safe to eat" list, Bronson said. Growers will provide a certificate with each shipment verifying the tomatoes are from Florida.

Tomato harvesting is currently under way in three areas of the state - Quincy, near Tallahassee; and Ruskin and Palmetto, near Tampa. At least $40 million worth of Florida tomatoes were not harvested or were turned away by stores and restaurants in the last few days, according to Reggie Brown, executive vice president of the Florida Tomato Growers Exchange.

J. Luis Rodriguez, trade adviser for Florida Farmers Inc. in Lake Worth, said today he has advised Florida tomato growers to seek compensation from the government for their losses.

Before clearing Florida, the FDA had said that only Mexico and Florida remained on the suspect list.

Because the outbreak began in states bordering Mexico that obtain tomatoes from that country, the FDA knew from the beginning the problem stemmed from tomatoes from Mexico, Rodriguez claimed.

"It doesn't take a genius to figure it out," he said. "The damage is already done. We are going to see a hard road to build consumer confidence in the next few weeks."

Elsewhere Tuesday, a major Mexican tomato-growers' association says shipments to the United States have stopped as U.S. authorities investigate the origin of a salmonella outbreak.

But a spokesman for the Sinaloa state Tomato Growers Association says it's just a precaution; there's no evidence so far that the salmonella originated in Mexico, which accounts for about a third of winter tomatoes in the United States.

In 2006-07, Florida's tomato industry had $464 million in cash receipts. The industry has an estimated direct and indirect economic value of $1.1 billion in total direct and indirect economic impact, the state says.

~'susan_salisbury@pbpost.com