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Jul 22, 2009 08:30 PM | 11
The Food Safety Enhancement Act (H.R. 2749), a bill currently being moved through the House of Representatives and gaining attention over the summer, could give the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) authority to regulate the way animals are raised on farms—a prospect that worries many small farmers.
The bill brings to light the challenges of determining which government agency should be regulating which process. And generally, farmers are more comfortable with the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) governing farm production policies.
Many farmers believe that the FDA should regulate food and not necessarily the living organisms on the farm. One of the biggest concerns among farmers is the lack of FDA expertise regarding on-farm production, as pointed out by North Carolina Farm Bureau President Larry Wooten during his testimony at a June 17 congressional hearing on the bill. The Farm to Consumer News Web site reports that organic supporters are worried about burdensome and expensive regulations that the “food safety police,” as they call the FDA, might devise and enforce.
During a food safety hearing last month, however, co-sponsor of the bill, Rep. Henry Waxman (D) of California suggested that most farmers have nothing to worry about and the motivation to give the FDA an increased role in governing farm production stems from “the large number of recent outbreaks that have originated from food contamination on farms,” which reveals that “more oversight is needed.”
The House is expected to discuss the bill further this week.
Image of U.S. Capitol by Rambling Traveler via flickr
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11 Comments
Add CommentWell, *somebody* ought to be responsible. So far, spinach, lettuce, tomatoes, hot peppers, peanuts and more, the damn farmers ain't doin' all that much on their own. I mean to include the "processors" too.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAnd while we're going to excoriate the farmers, lets not leave out the RESTAURANTS. Salad bars, anyone?
Then after we clean up the food, let's say we clean up the Government--while we still can.
Just cause for regulation has been reached with the food industry scandals of the Bush Administration. Past time to clean up the food chain!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThat we have moved our food production out of country is sad and dangerous from a security view. Putting our trust in horribly underpaid and over worked foreigners is just the way of the rich and stupid. That our farmers are busy wasting everyone's time and wealth with the corn - oil scam is sad too---but then what's right after eight years of Republican domination?
How will this affect produce imported from Mexico, Chile or the EU?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe intention is laudable, but the logic seems spurious. Perhaps we should clean up the federal government before we trust them to clean up the food, considering the FDA has done such a bang-up job already (Yellow No. 5, anyone? Phenylalanine, anyone? High Fructose Corn Syrup, anyone? Partially Hydrogenated oils, anyone?--And that's just their ventures into food; let's not get started on the drugs...).
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIt may be unfair, too, to assume the "damn farmers ain't doin' all that much on their own." The farmers are likely doing what they have always done, which has worked well for hundreds of years (or, if anything, has improved). It is on-point to include the Processors and Restaurants (and add "Manufacturers"), though.
Putting the FDA in charge of anything organic or natural is a frightening prospect.
From what I've gleaned from other sources, this "Food Safety" bill would put onerous demands on small farmers. The intent seems reasonable, given the recent outbreaks that FDA found so hard to trace.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIt should be noted, however, that the sources of disease have been corporate agriculture. The focus of such a "Food Safety" bill should be to burden these massive corporations with responsibility - something small farmers already self-impose, especially "organic" farmers.
Instead, we see this bill allowing corporate farms to merely sample their product statistically while the small farmer is required to test and certify each and every unit of product. It's bass-ackwards.
The problem, Quinn, is that these mass poisonings aren't being caused by small farmers. They're exclusively the fault of large producers who cut corners for the sake of convenience and profit. And those people absolutely need to be brought back into line. But HR 2749 and similar bills apply blanket restrictions that will be ruinous to small farmers and not really do that much to keep large producers/distributors/processors in check...
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