Bill would give FDA a mandate to prevent food-borne illness

By JERRY HAGSTROM

For the Capital Press

WASHINGTON, D.C. -- The long stalled food-safety bill was finally moving forward in the Senate on Nov.17, but it remained unclear at press time whether the bill would pass the Senate or whether differences between the House and Senate bills can be resolved before Congress adjourns in December.

The bill would give increased authority to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration to monitor production and processing of food production that comes under its jurisdiction. The United Fresh Produce Association began promoting the bill after outbreaks of food-borne illness from tainted spinach and imported jalapeno peppers reduced consumer confidence in the fruit and vegetable food supply.

The FDA has generally dealt with food-borne illness after an outbreak occurs, but the bill gives FDA a mandate to prevent food-borne illness rather than address it after it happens. The bill would require producers to make detailed reports to the FDA and gives the FDA additional authority for inspections.

A companion bill passed the House earlier this year, but some food industry leaders and small-farm advocates were dissatisfied with certain provisions. Some food industry executives objected to fees included in the bill, and the Sustainable Agriculture Coalition, which represents small farmers, objected to the provision that would require all producers to pay the same registration fee was unfair to small farmers and companies.

Sen. Jon Tester, D-Mont., has written an amendment that would give state and local governments rather than the FDA jurisdiction over companies with less than $500,000 in sales, that sell the majority of their product directly to consumers, restaurants and retailers within the same state or nearby or that the FDA determines are a "very small business."

United Fresh and other large producers have charged that lesser requirements for smaller producers would mean that the nation would not have a universally higher food-safety standard, but Tester said that the amendment is appropriate because the foods that come from smaller producers do not travel such great distances.

"The industrial model impacts more people. With smaller production, (there are) more eyes to the egg, to the pound of lettuce," Tester said . He added that small producers "are not raising a commodity," but "are raising food." Industrial agriculture, he said, "takes the people out of the equation."