WASHINGTON - In the wake of an E. coli outbreak traced to lettuce contamination at an Ohio company, a House committee heard testimony on two government reports revealing that the FDA inspects just one in four U.S. food facilities each year, the San Francisco Chronicle reports.

Last week the Government Accountability Office (GAO) and Office of Inspector General urged the U.S. House Energy and Commerce Committee to increase FDA??s power to issue mandatory recalls and require food facilities to impose new safety controls.

The reports offered further support for bipartisan safety legislation in the Senate, S. 510, and H.R. 2749, which passed the House last July.

The GAO reported that food imports are increasing rapidly and currently comprise 60 percent of fresh fruits and vegetables and 80 percent of seafood sold in the United States. Currently, the FDA examines just 1 percent of imported foods. While a computer system operating in Los Angeles and New York identifies high-risk foods in Los Angeles and New York, it has yet to rollout nationally.

The report also noted that the FDA inspected just 153 of 189,000 foreign food facilities in 2008, or 0.08%, and the Office of Inspector General report noted that more than half of all food facilities have gone five years or more without inspection.

Michael Taylor, the FDA??s deputy commissioner for foods, said that the House bill would require all food facilities to have safety controls in place that prevent contamination.

However, Deborah Stockton, executive director of the National Independent Consumers and Farmers Association, said that neither report addresses "the main causes of food contamination ?" centralized processing, centralized production and long-distance transportation."

"[The FDA is] failing to act with the authority it already has," Stockton said.