How can the risk of cross-contamination be minimized in food preparation?

Cross contamination can be minimized in food preparation by storing food properly, using designated cutting boards for meats and produce, cleaning all cooking surfaces and knives, and washing hands continuously while cooking.
 
Transcript: "How can the risk of cross-contamination be minimized in food preparation? This is a great question because it's a very important part of food safety practice at home. First of all, it's about food storage. So you want to be sure that you're storing food properly in terms of overall food safety. Cold foods stay cold, hot foods stay hot. You can avoid cross-contamination by making sure that any kind of raw foods, especially raw meats, meat, beef, pork, poultry, raw fish, are not coming into contact with any other type of food. For instance, your produce, your fruits, your vegetables. It's a great idea to kind of designate a cutting board for meat and a cutting board for produce and other foods. You should be keeping all of your cooking surfaces clean. Your cutting boards should be washed with hot soapy water and they should be stored clean. All of your knives and cookware should be clean as well. So you don't want to use a fork to pick up a piece of raw chicken and then use that same fork to stir a pot or to do anything else with. You want to keep everything separated. Raw foods should be separate from cooked foods and raw meats should be separate from raw fruits and vegetables. And then when you're done cooking, you want to make sure you clean surfaces properly. Always keep your hands washed, store all of your cutting boards and knives clean and properly. I hope that helps. One more quick thing. Wash your hands continuously. Keep your hands washed. So while you're cooking, wash them several times in between."
 USDA food safety guide