The following article is excerpted from the 7 July 2008 edition of  American Shipper.

U.S. food and health inspectors will begin stopping shipments of ingredients from Mexico commonly used to make salsa as the search continues for the possible source of a salmonella outbreak that has sickened more than 940 people in 40 states, CNN reported on its web site over the weekend.

Officials have expanded their investigation beyond tomatoes to include cilantro, jalapeño peppers, Serrano peppers, scallions and bulb onions, a Food and Drug Administration spokesperson told the news organization.

CNN said investigators plan to halt imports at the [US-Mexico] border, take samples and send them to laboratories to examine them for possible salmonella or E. coli bacteria spread from animal or human fecal material.

Meanwhile, a team of FDA inspectors is collecting soil, water and produce samples, reviewing export logs and irrigation methods, and visiting packing plants in three major tomato-producing states in Mexico. The inspectors have visited five farms so far.

The difficulty in finding the original source of the contamination after the Food and Drug Administration warned in April about three types of tomatoes has increased calls for a better system to trace food through the supply chain.

Mexico supplies 80 percent of the tomatoes imported into the United States and the U.S. warnings have Mexican officials worried about harm to their $1 billion tomato industry.

Tomatoes from Florida and Texas are also under suspicion.