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Safeguard Food Supply But Respect Small Farms

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The Tampa Tribune

Published: March 23, 2009

The mass production of food creates risks of sickening the masses, whether through unsanitary conditions, unhealthy additives, or even intentional tampering.

This nation needs to modernize oversight of food production and give itself the power to recall unsafe food products.

Recent contamination of pet food here and baby food in China, along with salmonella scares in peanut butter, are reminders that some producers are willing to cut corners to make a profit, if the guardians of the public health let them get away with it.

And the inability to quickly isolate a major source of a food-borne illness can hurt the innocent, as Florida tomato growers learned when bad produce from out of state spooked shoppers out of buying Florida-grown tomatoes that had never been tainted.

Finding the right level of regulation is difficult. Some proposals in Congress do too little and others go so far they could put some small farmers out of business.

Congress should take time to listen to voices beyond the lobbyists employed by the industrial farms and big importers. Carefully crafted reforms will improve food safety without sharply raising prices or sending the food police snooping around every vegetable patch and pasture.

Lawmakers should listen, for starters, to the catfish farmers throughout the South who are proud of their reputation for bringing clean, healthy fish to market.

They are in competition with increasing amounts of Chinese imports, some of which have been found to contain traces of all sorts of chemicals U.S. farmers don't use, including melamine, fungicide, and antibiotics.

The U.S. catfish farmers can't understand why the Food and Drug Administration doesn't test imported seafood products for the possibly dangerous drugs and chemicals. The importers are allowed to hire labs that do the testing, which is a conflict of interest. U.S. farmers suspect a lab could keep testing until it gets a clean result, and then submit that.

With some 4.5 million fish farms in China sending fish to one million processors, it's hard to feel confident that the system of self-regulation is good enough.

Now, about two percent of imported catfish are tested by private labs. The catfish farmers are pushing for 10 percent tested in government labs, and the request seems reasonable

Such details are important. One proposed bill would require all imported foods to adhere to the same standards of safety and quality that are enforced by the FDA. It sounds good but allows importers to document their own safety.

Another proposal would create a new Food Safety Administration. Another would create a national tracking system for food. There is no shortage of ideas.

The challenge is to improve safety without raising the price so much that small producers are plowed under and market choices diminish. One bill would require that each food operation write its own food safety plan that lists all the likely hazards and methods to overcome them.

Some small, organic farmers sense an effort here by the industrial farms to put them out of business. The bill would regulate "growing, harvesting, sorting, and storage operations, minimum standards related to fertilizer use, nutrients, hygiene, packaging, temperature controls, animal encroachment, and water."

The biggest risk to public health isn't from small producers who tend to stress quality, freshness and short travel times from field to table. That market is too diverse to be effectively policed and is no threat to the nation's food security.

The risks that need mitigating come from the industrial-scale operations, especially the shiploads of imports whose origins are mysterious.

That's where the emphasis should be, and not on the local family farms that have historically done a good job of producing wholesome food.

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