PASA News |

Food Safety Issues

March 24, 2009

From: Brian Snyder, Executive Director

Re: Food Safety Issues at the State and Federal Level

I realize many of you have been inundated with urgent information and panic-driven action alerts of late with respect to food safety issues. This is NOT another one of those messages.  But I also don't want to minimize the importance of pending food safety policy initiatives to both our farmer and non-farming consumer members, especially given the mood of the country in the wake of the great peanut scandal in recent months. As such, this is a fairly lengthy message, and I hope you will take the time to absorb it all.

Let me get right to the bottom line of this discussion . . . the things we know for sure right now are these: 1) Nearly everyone in government, partly at our own urging over the years, seems to want to do something about food safety right now; 2) Whatever happens will not come as quickly as many people fear, and will be very controversial at every step of the process. The only caveat I'll add is that if another issue as big as the peanut thing comes along anytime soon, then all bets are off - we may be entering a time when executive orders, rather than painstakingly slow legislative processes, will prevail in a perceived emergency.

With those thoughts in mind, let me mention a couple more specific items regarding state and federal policy, respectively, and ask for your help in the former case.

Pennsylvania Food Safety Council – click here to view a copy of a proclamation recently (only publicized in the past couple of weeks) issued by Governor Rendell forming a new Food Safety Council by executive order. There are many things to be concerned about with respect to this new council, not the least of which is the tendency our state government has to form such bodies once the principle decisions presumably to be made have already been determined.  But right now, my main concern is that the two representatives of so-called "general agricultural organizations" have already been appointed, and they are the Pennsylvania Farm Bureau and PennAg Industries Association.  The problem here is obvious to all of us, though apparently not to the governor and those who have worked to assemble this council.  Accordingly, PASA has registered a complaint, along with our partners at the Rodale Institute, Pennsylvania Certified Organic and FoodRoutes Network, that no representation of the Sustainable/Organic/Local farm community has been included on the council thus far. To be clear, we do not question the participation of either PFB or PAI, but assert that it is not acceptable to leave out what is arguably the fastest growing segment of agriculture - especially given the focus on food - and the organizations that represent it.

So, we are asking for your help at this time, hopefully before many of you get mired in your springtime duties on the farm.  Please contact the governor and make the points that the world has changed, Pennsylvania actually is a leader nationally with respect to providing fresh, local food to its citizens from farms using sustainable and organic methods of production, and that we can no longer be ignored as an important part of the agricultural community in this state. For whatever reason, Governor Rendell has seemed particularly slow in terms of picking up the food system transition going on right beneath his nose, and I believe he could use some help in "getting it."  The various contact information for the governor's office is below for you to use as you choose.  Let's also keep in mind that, in contrast to a lot of messages he may receive regarding food and agriculture, ours have in the past been distinguished both by their passion and thoughtfulness, not by paranoia or flippant accusations - let's keep it that way!

Contact info for Governor Ed Rendell:

Governor Edward G. Rendell's Office
225 Main Capitol Building
Harrisburg, Pennsylvania 17120
Phone: (717) 787-2500
Fax: (717) 772-8284

An email submission form is available at this link:
http://sites.state.pa.us/PA_Exec/Governor/govmail.html

Federal Food Safety Policy - There have been may alerts sent out of late regarding several legislative initiatives involving food safety, most particularly the HR 875 bill introduced by Representative DeLauro (D-CT). I'll not try to add much to the discussion about this right now, except to assure you that this and other initiatives were discussed last week by our partners at the National Sustainable Ag Coalition (NSAC) in Washington D.C. at their annual meeting.  At this meeting, NSAC decided to form a Task Force to follow these developments and, more importantly, to craft over time (months, not years) some policy statements that will help to inform and guide this legislative process as it unfolds.  You will be glad to know that PASA has secured a position on that Task Force, and we'll be involved every step of the way.  With respect to HR 875, I am told that even Rep DeLauro does not expect her bill to be viable in and of itself, and that another, coming from another member of the House, will receive more emphasis later. But, as I said above, no one expects anything to happen quickly in any case.

I think it's also useful to review at this point that PASA is not primarily a policy-focused organization, though obviously we feel a great need to get more involved as time goes by.  There are a lot of such organizations out there - you've been hearing from them - who would love to have the educational, marketing and community-based programs that we emphasize on a daily basis, and we have no intention of changing our focus to the detriment of the work we do really well.  This is why we will continue to rely on the good work of NSAC and others - e.g. Center for Rural Affairs, Food and Water Watch and (in state) Chesapeake Bay Foundation, PennFuture, etc. - to inform us about important policy issues.  Of course, we rely on messages from our members and discussions on our listservs to inform the organization as well, so please keep up the good work in that respect!

Again, I apologize for the length of this message, but am hopeful you will find the information contained herein to be helpful to you in interpreting what all is going on right now.  As always, please feel free to let us know how you feel about anything I've said or the important issues we are facing together.