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USDA/FDA Won't Protect Public From Imports--You Have To!!!

Econ101

Well-known member
Keeping consumers in the dark



Alan Guebert

PEORIA JOURNAL STAR

May 1, 2007



If you could save $1,000 on the purchase of a new car or truck because it did not have a shatterproof windshield and side glass, would you cut the deal?



Of course not; the safety of you and your family is priceless.



Yet many ag businesses, farm groups and the federal government put a price on what you eat every day by promoting, lobbying and enacting food standards that do more to ensure their profits and your ignorance than provide public information and public safety.



Sometimes this price is as little as a penny per pound, the virtual nothingness researchers from five Land Grant institutions in 2003 estimated it would cost to implement country of origin labeling (COOL) for all food sold in the U.S.



COOL, remember, was a new element to the 2002 Farm Bill that mandated country of origin labeling for most retail food by September 2004.



But big meat packers, major livestock groups, some Congressional players and a reluctant U.S. Department of Agriculture worked together to keep COOL in the deep freeze; it still has not been fully implemented.



As such, American consumers are still in the dark - especially so for meat - when it comes to the country of origin for most of their food.



The silver bullet used by agbiz and their livestock allies to cripple COOL was - and remains - money: all complained it is too costly.



For example, a 2003 National Pork Producers Council-funded study concluded full implementation of COOL would cost producers $10.22 a head, drive down domestic consumer pork demand by 7 percent and slice U.S. pork exports 50 percent by 2010.



The study was a worse-case examination but it - and other gloomy reports by USDA and food lobbyists - had best-case results: COOL was shelved for most foods sold here.



But COOL is now moving again for several reasons.



First, the 2002 Farm Bill is undergoing a rewrite, and COOL proponents are again pushing Congress to make the law's implementation a priority in 2007. (So far, however, the anti-COOL giants appear to be winning this second round, too.)



Second, the pet food debacle - tainted Chinese wheat gluten in scores of U.S. dog and cat food brands - has again spotlighted the near powerlessness of under-funded, under-staffed and under-motivated U.S. food inspection agencies to keep tabs on the fast-moving, globalized food biz.



Third, even as the patchwork network of federal food inspection agencies becomes more overwhelmed by their growing tasks, other agencies are looking for ways to open the nation's food import door even wider.



For example, USDA continues to work on rules that will permit the United States to import over-30-month-old cattle from Canada, a practice that was halted when Canada's first BSE-positive, or mad, cow was found in 2003. USDA, Canada and multinational meatpackers insist the risk posed by these older cattle to American consumers is "minimal" and that imports should resume.



USDA is also working on rules that will permit:



· areas within Argentina to export beef to the U.S. despite the presence of foot-and-mouth disease there;



· "the importation of uncooked pork and pork products from designated regions" - Mexico now, anywhere in the future - "where classical swine fever is considered to exist;"



· and as of April 20, China to export domestically raised, processed chicken to the United States.



You don't want to feed your family cheap beef from Argentina, cheap pork from Mexico or cheap poultry from China? Fine, but how are you going to know where it came from if agbiz, their allied farm groups and USDA continue to keep country of origin labeling from being fully implemented?



The short answer is, you won't know.



pjstar.com
 
A

Anonymous

Guest
But big meat packers, major livestock groups, some Congressional players and a reluctant U.S. Department of Agriculture worked together to keep COOL in the deep freeze; it still has not been fully implemented.

Only one major cattle group that opposed/are opposing implementing M-COOL--- that is the NCBA- who are in the same corporate pockets as the poultry and hog farmers... The rest of the cattlemen want to stop the deception NCBA helps promote and truthfully tell consumers what country their meat product comes from...
 

Econ101

Well-known member
Oldtimer said:
But big meat packers, major livestock groups, some Congressional players and a reluctant U.S. Department of Agriculture worked together to keep COOL in the deep freeze; it still has not been fully implemented.

Only one major cattle group that opposed/are opposing implementing M-COOL--- that is the NCBA- who are in the same corporate pockets as the poultry and hog farmers... The rest of the cattlemen want to stop the deception NCBA helps promote and truthfully tell consumers what country their meat product comes from...

Who are they representing in this instance, the producers or the packers?

Pretty easy to tell. You would think that an organization that represents both would have to exclude itself because of conflicts of interest.

By not doing that, we see whose interests are really promoted.

Just as in poultry, the national organizations are run by the packers/integrators. Anytime producers wanted to get together and fight these interests, the integrators stepped in and taught them a lesson.

I guess the 11th circuit would call this a "legitimate business interest"---running out any voice to the contrary so they could keep cheating producers, influencing politicians, and killing the competition. The only thing you have to do is claim that you are giving some of the benefit to consumers----even if you are not.
 
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