This is only one of the bills currently in Congress that have the potential to 
make trouble for small farmers, gardeners, hunters and local food in general.? 
The Weston A. Price Foundation keeps pretty good track of this stuff.? Here is 
their alert.


 -----Original Message-----
From: Weston A. Price Foundation <[log in to unmask]>
To: [log in to unmask]
Sent: Mon, 16 Mar 2009 4:32 pm
Subject: FLAWED FOOD SAFETY BILLS IN CONGRESS


IMPORTANT ACTION ALERT
FLAWED FOOD SAFETY BILLS IN CONGRESS

Many of you have been hearing about HR 875, a food safety bill that has been 
introduced in Congress.  Although much of what has circulated the internet is 
not accurate, HR 875 does pose serious problems for sustainable farmers and 
their consumers. Unfortunately, there are already four other "food safety" bills 

that also pose serious problems:  HR 814, HR 759, S 425, and S 510.  HR 814 is 
essentially a mandatory NAIS bill, while the others focus on produce, processed 
foods and game under FDA jurisdiction.

Consumers who buy nutrient-dense foods from local, sustainable farmers can feel 
secure about the safety of their food.  The same is not true for the majority 
who buy their food in grocery stores from mass-production industrialized 
operations.  We understand the pressure that Congress faces to improve the 
safety of that mainstream system.  But it is critical that the laws not 
interfere with the right to choose local foods or with our farmers' ability to 
raise safer, healthier foods!

Small sustainable farms are fundamentally different from factory farms, and 
should not be regulated the same way!  All of the proposed food safety bills 
suffer from a "one-size-fits-all" approach.  And even though the bills' sponsors 

might intend for them to apply only to food crossing state lines, the federal 
agencies regularly take a broader view of their jurisdiction.  The FDA's and 
USDA's past actions clearly show that Congress must place strict limitations on 
these agencies, or they will impose burdensome and unfair regulations and 
enforcement actions on small farms.

We don't know which of these bills will move forward to committee hearings -- or 

perhaps another bill, not yet filed, will be the one to move forward.  So we 
encourage everyone to send a clear message: Protect our farms from bad 
regulation!

TAKE ACTION:  Call your U.S. Representative and Senators.  If you do not know 
who represents you, you can find out at www.congress.org or by calling the 
Capitol Switchboard at 202-224-3121.  Ask to speak to the staffer who handles 
food safety issues.

Talk with the staffer about why you support local foods.  Tell them you oppose 
the five bills listed above.  Ask that they support a food safety bill that 
focuses on the real threats to food safety, such as uninspected imports from 
China and lax inspections of massive slaughterhouses and other factory 
processing, and ask that any new laws explicitly exempt small farmers. Explain 
that this issue cannot be left to the agencies' discretion, and you want a clear 

focus on the broken factory farm system and not on small, sustainable farmers.

UPDATE: Congressional Hearing on NAIS

Last Wednesday, the U.S. House Subcommittee on Livestock, Dairy and Poultry held 

a hearing on NAIS.  The questions and comments of several of the Subcommittee 
members revealed that they view NAIS as a food safety program and critical for 
animal health in case of a "catastrophic outbreak."  One member said, in 
essence, that the costs to farmers financially and in loss of privacy must be 
weighed against the "cost in human life" if NAIS isn't implemented.   

Yet USDA continues to provide absolutely no scientific evidence to support the 
claim that NAIS will do anything at all to improve animal health or food safety!  

What NAIS will do is impose government surveillance and significant expense on 
animal owners for no real benefit to the public.  The only ones who will benefit 

from NAIS are the meat packers and exporters, tag manufacturers, database 
managers and other large corporations.

TAKE ACTION #2:  You can send written testimony to the Subcommittee before 
Friday, March 20.  Send your testimony to the Hearing Clerk, Jamie Mitchell, at 
[log in to unmask]   

Put "March 11 Hearing - Animal Identification Programs" in the subject line.  
Keep your comments clear, polite, and concise.

And be sure to send a copy to your Representative and Senators!  A copy of your 
letter to the Subcommittee makes a great follow-up to the phone call we suggest 
above.


Our postal address is 
PMB #106-380
4200 Wisconsin Avenue, NW
Washington, District of Columbia 20016
United States