An online publication focused on the produce industry has published the final installment of a recent series of articles about produce traceability contributed by a produce standards consultant. Titled “What is the ROI on PTI?,” the article by Gary Fleming discusses the benefits of implementing the Produce Traceability Initiative (PTI), a voluntary industry-developed standard, even though it is not required by law. As Perishable Pundit’s Jim Prevor notes, if the law does not require PTI and buyers do not require a PTI-compliant supply chain, “then we are left with attempting to justify PTI on a return-on-investment basis.” According to Fleming, PTI was intended to use existing technology and standards “to enable whole chain traceability with the minimal amount of costs.” Among other matters, PTI standardizes the information used to trace produce and how that information is captured, provides quicker access to information in the event of a recall and allows…
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According to research recently conducted by Harvard’s Medical School and School of Public Health in collaboration with the Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI), food manufacturers and chain restaurants have responded to trans fat restrictions and bans by improving the quality of the foods rather than simply reverting to the use of saturated fats. Dariush Mozaffarian, Michael Jacobson & Julie Greenstein, “Correspondence: Food Reformulations to Reduce Trans Fatty Acids,” The New England Journal of Medicine, May 27, 2010. The authors state that they “identified 83 reformulated products (58 supermarket foods and 25 restaurant foods),” and studying product labels, they found that trans fats and saturated fats were reduced in 90 percent of the supermarket products and 96 percent of the restaurant products. In a statement about the research, CSPI’s executive director said, “This paper demonstrates that the U.S. food industry has been generally responsible in replacing partially hydrogenated oils…
In an article reprinted by AlterNet with the permission of The Humane Society of the United States (HSUS), journalist and freelance writer Ian Shearn provides an in-depth look at public relations guru/lobbyist Rick Berman. Shearn contends that Berman is making a fortune taking money from large corporations to attack the charities that criticize big business and to otherwise lobby against laws that regulate business, such as those preventing animal cruelty in animal husbandry. Because Berman operates as a public charity, he is not required to disclose who funds his multimillion dollar campaigns, as MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow learned when she interviewed him earlier this year and he refused to reveal his funding sources. Shearn discusses the various entities Berman has established, including the Center for Consumer Freedom (CCF) “to educate the public on food and beverage issues,” and the American Beverage Institute “to fight government regulation of alcohol consumption,” as well…
The Animal Welfare Institute (AWI) has apparently launched a campaign “to publicly expose Perdue for using misleading labeling claims to manipulate consumers who are trying to make humane choices in the market place.” In a letter to Perdue Farms,Inc., AWI directs the company to cease advertising some of its chicken products as “Humanely Raised” or “Raised Cage Free” because these terms do not reflect “any meaningful improvement upon conventional husbandry.” According to the letter, such claims exploit the average consumer’s unfamiliarity with industry practices by implying “the chickens are raised under conditions that exceed the norm.” See AWI Press Release, May 12, 2010. Meanwhile, Perdue has reportedly defended the labels as responsive to consumer requests for additional education. “Consumers told us they regard the USDA Process Verified Program as being the most credible available today,” one Perdue representative was quoted as saying. “We therefore developed several USDA Process Verified programs,…
The Pew Charitable Trusts’ Produce Safety Project (PSP) at Georgetown University has issued a report that calls for a “unified, cross agency” approach to tracking foodborne pathogens in humans, animals, food, and feed. Titled Building the Foundations of a Modern Food Safety System, the report charges the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), Food and Drug Administration (FDA), and U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) with summarizing “surveillance data on human foodborne illnesses—including outbreaks and sporadic cases—and on pathogen contamination in domestic and imported animals, food and feed.” PSP apparently based its recommendations on “extensive research and interviews” with food safety authorities in Denmark, The Netherlands, and the United Kingdom, according to a May 10, 2010, press release. The group has urged U.S. regulators to learn from steps taken by these countries to reform their food safety data collection and analysis since the 1990s. In addition, the report provides specific…
Human Rights Watch has issued a report titled “Fields of Peril: Child Labor in US Agriculture” that describes the working conditions facing the nation’s youngest field laborers and calls for changes to federal employment and environmental laws to provide them with greater protections. According to the report, child farmworkers as young as age 12 often work for 10 or more hours per day, five to seven days a week. Some begin working part-time at ages 6 or 7. Many of the labor law protections for other youth workers apparently do not apply to agricultural workers, and Human Rights Watch reportedly found that many children earn far less than minimum wage, particularly when they are paid for production rather than by the hour and when their employers charge them for tools, gloves and drinking water. They also have higher rates of dropping out of school and experience higher numbers of fatalities…
The Institute of Medicine (IOM) this week published a consensus report titled Evaluation of Biomarkers and Surrogate Endpoints in Chronic Disease, which urges the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to apply “the same degree of scientific rigor for evaluating biomarker use across regulatory areas, including drugs, medical devices, biologics, foods, and dietary supplements.” IOM describes biomarkers, such as blood cholesterol levels, as “biological yardsticks” used to predict health effects when it is difficult to measure the actual incidence of disease or death. According to a May 12, 2010, press release, “FDA has been hampered in its ability to assess the proliferation of health claims being made by food and supplement manufacturers in part because it lacks a process broadly accepted across the regulatory, food, and medical communities to evaluate biomarkers as valid and appropriate measurements to substitute for clinical outcomes.” Commissioned by FDA, the report proposes a three-part framework for…
An umbrella organization for animal welfare groups in the European Union has reportedly signed a declaration creating the Transatlantic Animal Welfare Council (TAWC), a cooperative agreement with U.S. activists that seeks to enforce humane handling standards in international trade. According to Eurogroup for Animals, the new forum seeks to “optimize resources by sharing knowledge, expertise and experience” among TAWC signatories, which include the Animal Welfare Institute, Compassion in World Farming, the Humane Society of the United States, the International Fund for Animal Welfare, and the Royal Society for the Preservation of Animals. To this end, TAWC will convene “a plenary session two times per year and set up a number of expert working groups to focus on specific topics of mutual interest, such as animal testing, sustainable agriculture as well as specific bilateral and multilateral trade issues. ” TAWC apparently aims to build upon the efforts of the Transatlantic Economic…
British Heart Foundation Chief Executive Peter Hollins has penned an article in the April 2010 issue of Parliament Magazine that urges members of the European Parliament (MEPs) to undertake more stringent reform of food labeling laws. “To improve diets across Europe, the European Heart Network (EHN) advocates for clear and consistent labels on all foods that will help European consumers understand the nutritional content of the food they are buying,” writes Hollins in support of mandatory nutrition facts as well as front-of-pack traffic light systems. Hollins claims that the guideline daily amounts (GDAs) favored by the food and beverage industry do not provide “an interpretation of relative healthiness in the quick and simple way that consumer surveys repeatedly show traffic light colors do.” He specifically claims that “the strongest front of pack label is one combining traffic light colors, use of the words ‘high ‘medium’, and ‘low’, and GDAs.” This…
Citizens for Health is calling on supporters to contact their congressional representatives to vote for a number of bills that would allow food producers and manufacturers of food supplements to make health-related claims for their products on the basis of peer-reviewed scientific evidence. Representative Ron Paul (R-Texas) introduced the Freedom of Health Speech Act (H.R. 3394) and the Health Freedom Act (H.R. 3395) in 2009; both were referred to the House Committee on Energy and Commerce where they remain pending. Representative Jason Chaffetz (R-Utah) introduced the Free Speech About Science Act of 2010 (H.R. 4913) in March; it was also referred to the House Committee on Energy and Commerce. See Citizens for Health Action Alert, May 5, 2010.
