DES MOINES - Strengthening America's food-safety system to protect consumers against deadly outbreaks is a pressing priority that needs congressional action, Sen. Tom Harkin, D-Iowa, said Wednesday.

"This is an urgent matter. We can't put it off," Harkin told a food safety forum at Drake University.

"Americans enjoy basically safe and wholesome food. But, let's be honest, it can be safer, and it must be safer. There is a shared interest all through the food systems to do much better," he added. "It is time - it is past time - to modernize U.S. food safety laws and regulations."

Harkin said he expects the U.S. Senate to pass a comprehensive food safety reform package yet this year that would give the Food and Drug Administration new oversight and enforcement powers. The measure likely would go to a conference committee to hammer out differences with a House-passed version that included stronger inspection authorities for federal officials when investigating domestic facilities and imports.

Harkin said the proposed legislation could impose fees on food producers and processors to support a broader, more effective inspection system, but he was hopeful it would not result in higher costs to consumers.

Harkin made his comments at a forum sponsored by the Pew Charitable Trusts, which used the occasion to release a poll it commissioned that found 90 percent of voting Iowans believe government regulators should be given additional authority to ensure the food Iowans eat does not make them sick.

The survey of 511 registered Iowa voters last month indicated 49 percent of the poll participants were less confident in the safety of food sold in the United States following high-profile outbreaks in recent years in which pathogens in peanut butter, pistachios, peppers, spinach and other food resulted in illnesses - including deaths of a number of children and elderly citizens.

The poll, conducted by Hart Research and Public Opinion Strategies with a margin of error of 4.3 percent, also found that 81 percent of the respondents believed the federal government should be responsible for ensuring that food is safe to eat, and 53 percent believed the federal government is doing too little to ensure that imported food is safe from contamination.