"Federal regulators propose nothing to address sick livestock in animal factories and their pathogen-laden manure that is contaminating surrounding rural communities, nearby produce farms and our food supply," Kastel lamented.
No More
Organic Eggs?
The 2010 salmonella outbreak in eggs, centered in Iowa, shone a spotlight on industrial-scale egg houses confining thousands of hens in filthy and dangerous conditions.
The salmonella outbreak led to comprehensive regulation and new guidance for organic farmers. Organic farmers are required by federal law to provide outdoor access to their hens and the new FDA guidance, according to Cornucopia, materially undermines this management practice. And they are doing this despite scientific evidence tying higher rates of pathogenic contamination to older, massive factory farms with cages and forced molting (practices banned in organics) rather than raising birds outside.
"Their new guidance, on one hand, will make it difficult, expensive and maybe even impossible to have medium-sized flocks of birds outside," Kastel stated. "At the same time, the FDA has colluded with the USDA's National Organic Program to say that tiny 'porches', which hold only a minute fraction of the flock, will now legally constitute 'outdoor access.' This is a giveaway to conventional egg companies that are confining as many as 100,000 birds in a building and calling these 'organic.'"
The Cornucopia Institute has publicly stated that they are investigating legal action against regulators if enforcement action is not taken, under the Organic Foods Production Act , against the large industrial operations confining laying hens and broilers indoors.
The issue of food safety in Washington has been a contentious one, causing rifts even between nonprofits representing the interest of consumers and family farm organizations that have been historically aligned in support of organic and local food. Some consumer advocates pressed for no exemptions, even as farm policy experts have supplied evidence indicating smaller, family-operated farms are inherently safer.
"Only an idiot would not be concerned with food safety," said Tom Willey, a Madera, California, organic vegetable producer and longtime organic advocate.
Added Willey: "The antibiotic resistant and increasingly virulent organisms contaminating produce, from time to time, are mutant creatures introduced into the larger environment from confined industrial animal operations across the American countryside. The FDA's misguided approach could derail achievements in biological agriculture and a greater promise of food made safe through respect for and cooperation with the microbial community which owns and operates this planet upon which we are merely guests."
MORE:
To access The Cornucopia Institute's white paper on food safety regulation, background on the FDA salmonella rule guidance for outdoor flocks, information on submitting comments directly to the FDA, or executing Cornucopia's proxy letter, visit their website: http://www.cornucopia.org/food-safety/.
Cornucopia's webpage above also includes links to the full
draft regulations for the FDA's Food Safety Modernization Act and the agency's
salmonella guidance.
(Note: You can view every article as one long page if you sign up as an Advocate Member, or higher).
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