Food Safety Lobbying Starts Anew

by: Jill Richardson

Tue Oct 13, 2009 at 06:32:14 AM PDT

NSAC's vision of agriculture is one where a safe, nutritious, and affordable food supply is produced by a legion of family farmers who make a decent living pursuing their trade, while protecting the environment, and contributing to the strength and stability of their communities. NSAC's work has resulted in federal programs that promote small and mid-sized family farms, increase new farming and ranching opportunities, invest in sustainable and organic research, reward conservation excellence, and expand local and regional food systems.

In other words, they stand right where I do about food safety. Yes, we need food safety reform, but we don't want it to harm small or mid-size farms or those who engage in sustainable practices. Additionally, because one of the best ways to survive as a small or mid-size farm is to market value-added products, the bill would present a problem if it created insurmountable barriers to farmers wishing to form small businesses that process and market food. Here's how NSAC says that:

To the extent that new federal food safety authority extends to the farm, NSAC urges policymakers to ensure that standards and regulations encourage farmers to seek out innovations and a more sustainable agriculture, and at least not create additional barriers to the widespread adoption of sustainable agriculture practices.

Later in the paper, they add (I LOVE this!):

Agriculture is a human endeavor based on biological processes, and nature cannot be eliminated from the equation. Food safety will not be achieved simply by monitoring and killing bacteria-it must come from a food system that values human relationships and environmental stewardship. The goal should not be to eliminate all risk of microbial contamination, but to reduce risk to the lowest level possible while optimizing the myriad other ways in which agriculture contributes to human and ecological health.

However, several food safety bills have been introduced into the 111th Congress that could directly or indirectly affect farms and ranches by expanding these authorities and making some on-farm safety standards mandatory. In addition, in the spring of 2009, the Obama Administration created an inter-agency Food Safety Working Group through which the Food and Drug Administration and U.S. Department of Agriculture are adopting new food safety standards and oversight, including on-farm measures.

While NSAC applauds Congress and the Administration for taking steps to decrease foodborne illnesses by strengthening federal food safety oversight and enforcement, in respect to farms it urges decision-makers to ensure that:

• Measures are risk-based, focus on risk reduction, and are justified by scientific research;
• FDA coordinates with other state and federal agencies and community-based organizations with food safety expertise or pre-existing standards or training programs for standard development and enforcement;
• Standards do not discriminate against, but encourage, diversified farming operations and conservation practices;
• Standards are appropriate to the scale of the enterprise;
• Fees of any kind, if they are imposed, are equitable to reflect different scales of productionand ability to pay;
• Traceability rules for farmers should not require more than good, basic recordkeeping (one-up, one-down) of all sales;
• Marketing Agreements and Orders are not used to regulate food safety.

NSAC members and food safety experts agree that the responsibility for ensuring that our food is safe is incumbent on all actors in the food supply chain: from farmers, packers, processors, and distributors, to the final consumer. It is our position, however, that proposals proffering one-size-fits-all solutions to food safety fail to acknowledge the diversity of agriculture and are inappropriate and counterproductive courses of action.

I find this statement by them to be particularly beautiful and descriptive of how I feel about our food system and food safety:

The farmers on whose behalf NSAC works are leaders in the areas of working-lands environmental stewardship, innovative marketing, and value-added processing. To a large extent, these farmers have deliberately chosen alternatives to the industrial agriculture and food chain that privileges uniformity over diversity, centralization over widespread ownership and control, and sterilization over natural habitat. As a coalition, we do not see these trends in industrial-style production as the destiny of agriculture, but rather as a model that is failing to provide a safe food supply, achieve economic security for producers, or ensure a resilient landscape and healthy human society.

The following are excerpts from the NSAC paper that I found particularly important to share:

We are compelled to note at the outset that despite the very narrow focus of the current debate on fresh produce and microbial pathogens, the umbrella of "food safety" involves a much broader range of public health issues related to food production, as well as other federal agencies besides the FDA. It is vital not to lose sight of this broader perspective.

They specifically call out CAFOs and the nontherapeutic use of antibiotics in livestock as risks to food safety. Together, these two practices make CAFOs breeding gournds for antibiotic-resistant bacteria.

These virulent and antibiotic-resistant microbes can and do find their way into produce fields through manure, dust, runoff, or contaminated waterways that carry pathogens into irrigation and wash water. Any new food safety regulations should seek to control these concentrated sources of livestock-related bacteria and pathogens first. [emphasis mine]

They also point out the importance of fresh fruits and veggies in a healthy diet, and the failure of many Americans (particularly those with limited incomes) to eat enough of them. Then they point to the success of small and mid-size farms at providing these foods to their local communities, concluding, "Thus, any food safety guidelines and standards that inhibit the growth or activities of produce farms or that limit local access to fresh, affordable produce are working against public health."

And how about strategies like irradiation or chlorination to sterilize foods?

Proposed food sterilization methods such as irradiation or high levels of chlorination may reduce the nutritional quality of fruits and vegetables by destroying phytochemicals and other healthy plant compounds, or creating new, unhealthful compounds. Produce safety approaches should promote fresh produce production and processing management systems that prevent pathogen levels high enough to warrant sterilization methods.

And then there's the idea that living soil is actually a good thing, which means reducing biodiversity in the name of food safety is NOT a good thing:

Lastly, FDA should acknowledge that healthy ecosystems contribute to food safety in a number of ways. Healthy, living soil will harbor a greater number and variety of both macroscopic and microscopic organisms, and will thus be less susceptible to colonization by unwanted pathogens.

Vegetative buffers can filter pathogens from streams and runoff, and protect cropland from windborne pathogens. According to a research literature review by Wild Farm Alliance, grasses and wetlands can greatly attenuate E. coli loads in runoff from cattle operations, with grass strips as narrow as six feet removing the majority of E.coli. On an even grander scale, lush, integrated farms can contribute to clean air, clean water, soil tilth, and overall environmental health, thus helping to protect the long-term health of our planet. We must consider these vital services when creating a new food safety system.

Next up, NSAC brings up the question of pesticides and other "agrochemicals." While these chemicals may pose a threat to food safety, they are outside the scope of the current food safety bill in Congress. Ditto on GMOs and irradiation.

With all of that out of the way, then NSAC begins talking about the topic the food safety bill DOES focus on: microbial pathogens.

Almost all major foodborne pathogens are of animal origin. E.coli and Salmonella, two of the most well-known contaminants, live and reproduce in animals, not in plants. Therefore, any vegetable that is contaminated with E. coli or Salmonella invariably received it from an animal source. Many cases of food contamination stem from infected humans who transmit the pathogen to the food during food processing, handling, or preparation. Unfortunately, the media and policymakers alike have incorrectly implied that vegetables are the "source" of many recent outbreaks of foodborne illness, when in fact they are the carriers.

The report then shows the order in which foods cause food poisoning outbreaks:

1. Seafood
2. Produce
3. Poultry
4. Beef
5. Eggs
6. Pork
7. Dairy
8. Luncheon/other meats
9. Bread/bakery
10. Beverages
11. Game

Obviously these are large aggregated groups, and the report notes that if you add up the various types of meats, they outnumber the outbreaks from produce. By the time you get all the way down the list to game, there are hardly any outbreaks or cases listed. Furthermore, the list above does not note where in the supply chain that food was contaminated, whether it was during growth, harvest, processing, or somewhere else. They give an example that shows the importance of analyzing this as follows:

the manner in which produce is processed can also increase the risk of foodborne pathogen cross-contamination. For instance, a study by the Community Alliance with Family Farmers of food-borne illness outbreaks in leafy greens since 1993 found that nearly 90% of outbreaks were linked to processed, bagged "ready to eat" salad mixes and not to unprocessed greens.

The lesson we should take from that?

Food safety standards should focus on the actual sources of contamination and potential vectors and practices that increase risk (e.g. packaging methods) in order to reduce the risk of vegetables carrying unacceptable levels of the pathogens.

So what's the government doing about this right now? The report begins by describing the big picture. 30 laws and 15 federal agencies govern food safety. Mostly food safety falls under the FDA (within the Dept of Health and Human Services) and the USDA's FSIS (Food Safety and Inspection Service). FSIS covers meat, poultry, and some eggs, and the FDA regulates most everything else (including produce, seafood, and shell eggs). But check this out:

The USDA FSIS receives the bulk of federal support even though the number of facilities and types of food products that USDA is responsible for are much fewer than the FDA. According to the Outbreak Alert database maintained by the Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI), FDA-regulated foods are linked to two-thirds of illness outbreaks, but FDA receives only approximately one-third of the funding for food safety activities.

67% of outbreaks are linked to foods regulated by FDA*
27% of outbreaks are linked to foods regulated by USDA
6% of outbreaks are linked to foods regulated by both.
*These numbers are for 1990-2005

In 2007, the FDA received $457 million for food safety, whereas the USDA received $892 million for food safety.

Slightly backwards? Probably. And while the high USDA budget is understandable when you consider that their inspectors are in slaughterhouses every single day whereas FDA inspections are only occasional, perhaps it shouldn't be SOOOO lopsided. No doubt this is at least a place to look when considering why we have the food safety problems we do.

Of course, the bill that passed the House has done this. Here's what NSAC says about that:

The major food safety bill passed by the House in the summer of 2009 is HR 2749-the Food Safety Enhancement Act of 2009-and costs $1.5 billion a year. The major source of funding for the bill is a mandatory registration fee for all food facilities that sell over 50.1% of their product into wholesale markets. The fee results in only $368 million a year. This funding provision is opposed by most small and mid-sized family farms and sustainable agriculture advocates because it disproportionately burdens smaller entities. In addition, it only covers a fraction of the bill's total cost leaving Congress having to come up with very substantial additional appropriations [emphasis mine]

Translation: The bill costs a lot of money, most of which will have to be appropriated by Congress. The fees assessed don't pay for most of the bill, and they disproportionately harm small and midsized producers.

I'll end here and continue with the second half of the report (which gets into the nitty gritty of the bills) in another diary.