Page 78 - Spring2013

In multiple 1. Birds of any age shipped from a hatch- Modernization Act, that significantly expanded
places in ery to a grower do not need to be indi- FDA’s authority. During the debates in Congress,
WAPF joined with over one hundred other orga-
vidually identified. The grower does
the produce have to keep a record of the hatchery nizations across the country to try to protect local
safety rule for two years. food producers from unnecessary and burden-
the agency 2. Poultry going to a custom slaughter some regulations. We succeeded in passing the
Tester-Hagan Amendment, which exempts small-
facility are exempt whether or not the
evidences meat will be consumed by the person scale local producers from the new burdens of
unwarranted moving the birds or someone else. hazard analysis plans (HACCP-type plans) and
fear of animal- Poultry being moved to an inspected slaugh- produce safety standards.

Specifically, the Tester-Hagan Amendment
based soil terhouse across state lines will need to be identi- protects producers who gross under five hundred
amendments, fied under the rule, but most producers should be thousand dollars annually from the sale of food

which include able to use group identification for their broilers, products (adjusted for inflation), and sell more
since broilers are typically managed in single-age than half (50.1 percent or more) of their products
compost and groups. The greatest impact will be on live bird to some combination of: (1) Individual consum-
compost teas. markets, where birds crossing state lines will ers, regardless of where they are located; (2)
most likely need to be individually identified. restaurants that are in the same state or within
Notably, a senior USDA staffer publicly stated two hundred seventy-five miles of the producer;
that individual identification requirements were and/or (3) retailers (such as co-ops, health food
not cost-effective for live bird markets and urged stores, and grocery stores) that are in the same
the agency not to require it. Yet the agency chose state or within two hundred seventy-five miles
to ignore its own expert on this issue. of the producer. Both the restaurants and the
The final rule is far from ideal―particularly retailers must in turn sell directly to consumers;
since it continues to focus government efforts in other words, the producer is no more than one
on after-the-fact measures like tracking sick step removed from the consumer. The remaining
animals, instead of focusing on disease preven- 49.9 percent of the producers’ products can be
tion, including supporting pasture-based systems sold to anyone or any business. This amendment
that produce healthy animals. But the fact that covers the vast majority of local food producers,
USDA made so many changes, compared to although not all.
both its original plan for NAIS and its more re- Even with the Tester-Hagan Amendment,
cent proposal, shows the growing power of our however, the bill poses problems for the local
movement and the impact we can have when we foods movement because of the new regulations
create effective coalitions. We need to continue that will be imposed on medium-scale producers.
our work on all fronts, from more growers on the In addition, although the FDA’s proposed regula-
ground to more political activism. tions won’t legally apply to small-scale, direct-
marketing producers, we are concerned that
FDA PROPOSES FOOD SAFETY RULES retailers will ultimately require compliance as a
And speaking of the need for more politi- condition for doing business with them―forcing
cal activism, we need many people to speak up producers either to comply or be limited to a 100
against the FDA’s new proposed rules on food percent direct-marketing model in practice, thus
safety! In January, FDA issued proposed rules limiting the consumers who can access these
under the 2010 Food Safety Modernization Act foods.
to address on-farm produce safety standards and On January 16, 2013, the FDA issued
HACCP-type regulations for processed foods. proposed regulations to implement the major
The proposed rules fulfill many of our worst provisions of the act. The FDA’s publication
expectations of what the agency would do with included over twelve hundred pages of material,
its new powers. encompassing both the proposed rules and the
As a brief review, in December 2010, Con- explanatory introduction. The proposed rules
gress passed a food safety bill, the Food Safety cross-reference other documents, resulting in an
78 Wise Traditions SPRING 2013 SPRING 2013 Wise Traditions