Meet the Team
David Acheson, MD
Dr. David Acheson has more than 40 years of medical and food safety experience, having practiced medicine for several years and serving in prominent roles with both the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and USDA Food Safety and Inspection Service. David served as the Chief Medical Officer of the Food Safety and Inspection Service. He then joined the FDA as the Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition (CFSAN) Chief Medical Officer; from which he moved to Director of CFSAN’s Office of Food Defense, Communication and Emergency Response; and was then appointed as the Assistant and then Associate Commissioner for Foods. In this role, David held agency-wide leadership for all food and feed issues, and he developed the 2007 Food Protection Plan, which served as the basis for many of the authorities granted to FDA by the Food Safety Modernization Act.
In 2013, David founded The Acheson Group, where he used his regulatory insight, food safety knowledge, and expertise in crisis response to advise food industry clients around the globe on how to best manage risk in a global supply chain and evolving regulatory landscape. He has published extensively and is internationally recognized for both his public health expertise in food safety and his research in infectious diseases. He is a sought-after speaker and regular guest on national news programs; serves on a variety of boards and food safety advisory groups of several major food manufacturers; and is a fellow of both the Royal College of Physicians (London) and the Infectious Disease Society of America.
Benjamin Miller, Ph.D., MPH
Dr. Miller has twenty-five years of experience in food safety, public health, epidemiology, and infectious disease outbreak investigations. Ben earned his Ph.D. in Environmental Health with a background in infectious diseases and his Master of Public Health in Epidemiology.
He currently serves as the Executive Vice President of Regulatory and Scientific Affairs at the Acheson Group where he works across multiple sectors advising on food safety, food safety culture, traceability, public health, outbreak-related and regulatory issues.
Dr. Miller also has extensive food regulatory experience and, as previous Division Director at the Minnesota Department of Agriculture, led the State of Minnesota’s Human and Animal Food regulatory work. In his role as a state regulator, Dr. Miller developed experience implementing legislative reforms on topics related to food safety and is an expert in FDA traceability requirements. He is currently a member of the International Association of Food Protection Program Committee.
Ranjeet Klair
Ranjeet Klair has over 20 years of industry experience working with Canadian, US and global food retailers, production plants, and certification bodies in food safety, quality assurance, and regulatory compliance. Ranjeet has held a variety of positions: Supplier of Food Safety and Compliance Manager, a Senior Manager of Food Safety and QA, Lead Auditor and Technical Advisor at International Certification Body, SAI Global/Intertek; worked closely with Canadian and US legislation, notably the US Food Safety Modernization Act (FSMA) and the Canadian Food Inspection Agency’s (CFIA) Safe Food for Canadians Act, and completed audits of over 200 food factories across North America; Global Director of Food Safety & Quality Assurance.
Ranjeet holds a Master of Science degree in Food Sciences, Master of Global Food Law (Jurisprudence) and a Bachelor of Applied Science and certification in International Food Law and Regulations. She is a trainer for Seafood HACCP (AFDO), Root Cause Analysis, GFSI (BRC lead and internal auditor training, FSSC 22000), PCQI, FSVP, Basic HACCP, Food Fraud & Food Defense, EMP training, and Gluten-Free Certification Program, and a certified FSSC22000 V6 and internal auditing trainer. Ranjeet is an active member of International Association for Food Protection (IAFP) and Canadian Association of Importers and Exporters.
Ranjeet is fluent in English, Punjabi, Hindi, Gujarati, and Urdu.
Christopher Snabes
Christopher Snabes has over 20 years of experience in the food industry, specializing in food microbiology and food safety. Christopher’s past experience includes serving as a Food Technical Specialist for The American Proficiency Institute , with extensive experience in ISO documentation and its related quality procedures and advancing the Food Microbiology Proficiency Testing division with several innovative improvements for customers. Christopher has also been an Adjunct Professor in Microbiology and worked as a Food Microbiologist for Difco Laboratories R & D, and Domino’s Pizza, Inc., R & D, Quality Assurance Division.
Christopher received his BS in Professional Microbiology and MS in Biology from Eastern Michigan University and received his Certified Food Scientist (CFS) credential in 2013 as part of the inaugural class and renewed it in 2018 and 2023. He has published numerous international and domestic abstracts, papers, and co-authored a book chapter, in various fields of Microbiology, and presented his work at international and domestic scientific meetings. As a lead instructor for the Intentional Adulteration Vulnerability Assessment (IA VA) Utilizing the Three Elements course, Christopher is one of fewer than 100 FDA/FSPCA IA VA trained instructors globally. In 2023, the FSPCA recognized Christopher as one of the “Top 10” lead instructors based on the number of participants who completed the IA VA training and received a certificate.
Christopher is an active member in the Association of Food Industries, Association of Analytical Chemists (AOAC) and its U.S. Technical Advisory Group to ISO/Technical Committee 34; Institute of Food Technologists (IFT); The American Society for Microbiology (ASM), where he is a former five-year advisor (Council on Microbial Sciences) to the BOD as the sole representative for Food Microbiology; The Michigan Branch of ASM, where he is an Industry representative to the BOD; and the International Association for Food Protection (IAFP), where he is also a member of several PDG’s. Christopher is also an FSPCA-certified lead instructor for the FSMA Preventive Controls for Human Food, Preventive Controls for Animal Food, and Foreign Supplier Verification Program; and an AFDO-certified instructor for the Produce Safety Alliance.
