More than any other holiday, Thanksgiving is about food. We spend hours slicing, chopping and cooking. Then we eat a lot, eat some more and, finally, fall asleep on the couch. What better way to celebrate being an American?

But what we eat this Thursday, or any other day, may not be as safe as we think. Our food system has serious problems. Last summer a half-billion Salmonella-tainted eggs were recalled. Last year, Salmonella in peanut products killed nine Americans and sickened more than 700. And every year, food-borne illness afflicts 76 million Americans, leads to 300,000 hospitalizations and kills 5,000, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Why is this happening? We depend too much on food producers to catch problems, and that’s too often too little, too late. Most manufacturers work hard to ensure their products are safe. But with increasing globalization, a few large companies often produce food for millions, and one unscrupulous or incompetent manufacturer can put public health at risk from coast to coast.

To solve this problem, we must strengthen the agencies that oversee our food. Right now, the Food and Drug Administration and the U.S. Department of Agriculture – the thin blue line between our kitchens and a host of food-borne diseases – cannot adequately protect us. These agencies are underfunded and understaffed, lack the authority to hold food companies accountable for the safety of their products, and can’t keep pace with our increasingly complex food production and distribution system.

Every day, some of the food you eat has likely been processed at an uninspected plant. On average, the FDA, which is responsible for the safety of fruits, vegetables, eggs and seafood, inspects domestic food production facilities only once every 10 years. Food products generally pass through five or more facilities, which greatly increases the chances that your food was processed at a plant that hasn’t been inspected since Bill Clinton was president. And it’s even worse for food from overseas. The FDA inspects only about 1 percent of imported food products.

During an outbreak of food-borne illness, it is essential to track a product’s path. But a government study found that the FDA couldn’t trace nearly 90 percent of the products it reviewed back to the source. Federal food laws make the FDA’s job even more difficult by allowing producers and distributors to withhold information about a product’s origin from health officials, even during an outbreak. In addition, the FDA has no explicit authority to order companies to recall tainted foods.

These examples illustrate a critical fact: The food industry has too much influence over safety regulations. Earlier this year, the Union of Concerned Scientists surveyed more than 1,700 FDA and USDA food safety workers. Hundreds of the respondents said they had experienced political interference in their work, and that public health was compromised because their agencies buckled under to pressure from food and agricultural businesses. Many survey respondents questioned the safety of our food supply. Fewer than half said they are confident in the safety of fruits and vegetables. And only a third said they are confident in the safety of imported foods.

The Obama administration needs to do a better job insulating federal inspectors and scientists from this outside pressure. Early last year, President Barack Obama pledged to release a scientific integrity directive that would strengthen protections for whistle-blowers, ensure that all government scientists can speak openly about their work, and increase the transparency of government decisions that affect public health and safety. The president has yet to follow through on his promise.

Congress also can help. The Senate is now debating a food safety bill that would significantly overhaul the food safety system for the first time since 1938. It could grant the FDA broad authority to test for food-borne germs and strengthen its ability to trace outbreaks to the source. The proposed legislation also could give the agency power to recall contaminated foods, fine companies that knowingly sell them, and hold imported foods to the same standards as domestic products. The House passed the bill last year; the Senate is expected to vote on its version on Monday.

These steps won’t solve all of our food safety problems. But they will go a long way to ensure that next year, when we sit down to gorge on the last Thursday in November, we will have a safer food supply.