• If you are having problems logging in please use the Contact Us in the lower right hand corner of the forum page for assistance.

Ranchers.net

… Sixty percent … went organic because of food safety concerns … You'd think with numbers like that the cattle industry itself would be begging the FDA to increase, not decrease, its testing program …



Beef up cattle testing



By Bulletin Editorial staff

July 26, 2006

Bend, Oregon

US



Just as the need for testing cattle for bovine spongiform encephalopathy (mad cow disease) seems to grow, the federal Food and Drug Administration announced last week it will trim its paltry testing program even more come next month. That may make sense to the wise ones at FDA; it doesn't appear to do so from here.



The FDA's reasoning goes like this: Because we've turned up so little BSE, two confirmed cases in the last couple of years, it's clear there's hardly any of the stuff, and that makes the testing unnecessary and expensive. Consider, though, that the current testing program covers less than 1 percent of animals slaughtered most weeks. It's hard to make the case that any conclusions about the prevalence of the disease can be drawn as a result.



There are plenty of other things to think about, as well. The Japanese, who used to account for about 10 percent of this nation's beef sales, still are unconvinced that the U.S. supply is healthy. As Uncle Sam tries to change Japanese minds, he's had an uphill battle. Those ‘downer’ cattle, unable to walk, that aren't supposed to make it into the meat supply, have continued to do so, according to a USDA report issued last March. The same report found that at least nine meatpackers and slaughterhouses failed to meet government standards.



The government's problems don't end there. Despite rules that have been in place since 1997, some shipments of cattle feed continue to be contaminated with cattle remains. The number so contaminated isn't huge, according to The Associated Press, but that really isn't the point. If the FDA cannot enforce the rules it has in place, how can it possibly assure the Japanese - or Americans, for that matter - that the steak they eat is healthy?



More Americans care about just that these days, and their concerns neither begin nor end with beef. Organic food sales have grown by 16 percent to 21 percent a year for more than a decade, accounting for $14 billion last year. Organics still are not a huge chunk of the market, only about 2.5 percent of total sales, but they're growing at a much faster clip than the market as a whole, according to The Indianapolis Star. The result is that everyone from General Mills to Safeway to Wal-Mart has gotten into the organic act recently.



There's a reason for the shift. Sixty percent of those responding to a Harris poll in January said they went organic because of food safety concerns, the Star reported, while another poll showed that environmental concerns also ranked high.



You'd think with numbers like that the cattle industry itself would be begging the FDA to increase, not decrease, its testing program. And, you might reasonably think, the FDA might want to do so no matter what the industry says. So far that hasn't been the case. The result is that as more Americans (and Japanese) worry about the safety of U.S. foods, including beef, the government is trimming back to nearly nonexistent the only BSE testing program it has.





bendbulletin.com
Top