- A new food safety bill is on the fast track in Congress-HR
2749, the Food Safety Enhancement Act of 2009. The bill needs to be stopped.
HR 2749 gives FDA tremendous power while significantly diminishing existing
judicial restraints on actions taken by the agency. The bill would impose
a one-size-fits-all regulatory scheme on small farms and local artisanal
producers; and it would disproportionately impact their operations for
the worse.
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- HR 2749 does not address underlying causes of food safety
problems such as industrial agriculture practices and the consolidation
of our food supply. The industrial food system and food imports are badly
in need of effective regulation, but the bill does not specifically direct
regulation or resources to these areas.
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- To read a detailed account of the bill, go to: http://www.ftcldf.org/news/news-15june2009.htm
(Read the section on tracing. That is NAIS, isn't it? highly disguised
yet triggered by the word "trace." ) Alarming Provisions:
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- Some of the more alarming provisions in the bill are:
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- * HR 2749 would impose an annual registration fee of
$500 on any "facility" that holds, processes, or manufactures
food. [isn't this every home in the US, every garden?] Although "farms"
are exempt, the agency has defined "farm" narrowly. [What is
the definition?] And people making foods such as lacto-fermented vegetables,
cheeses, or breads would be required to register and pay the fee, which
could drive beginning and small producers out of business during difficult
economic times. [Yes. There are laws against this corporate-size-destroys-the-little-guy
policy, aren't there? Are home bread or cheese or lacto-fermented vegetable
makers who make for their own families included in this?]
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- * HR 2749 would empower FDA to regulate how crops are
raised and harvested. It puts the federal government right on the farm,
dictating to our farmers. [This astounding control opens the door to CODEX.
WTO "good farming practices" will include the elimination of
organic farming by eliminating manure, mandating GMO animal feed, imposing
animal drugs, and ordering applications of petrochemical fertilizers and
pesticides. Farmers, thus, will be locked not only into the industrialization
of once normal and organic farms but into the forced purchase of industry's
products. They will be slaves on the land, doing the work they are ordered
to do - against their own best wisdom - and paying out to industry against
their will.
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- There will be no way to be frugal, to grow one's own
grain to feed the animals, to raise healthy animals without GMO grains
or drugs, to work with nature at all. Grassfed cattle and poultry and hogs
will be finished. So, it's obvious where control will take us. And weren't
these the "rumors on the internet" that were dismissed but are
clearly the case?]
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- * HR 2749 would give FDA the power to order a quarantine
of a geographic area, including "prohibiting or restricting the movement
of food or of any vehicle being used or that has been used to transport
or hold such food within the geographic area." [This - "that
has been used to transport or hold such food" - would mean all cars
that have ever brought groceries home so this means ALL TRANSPORTATION
can be shut down under this. This is using food as a cover for martial
law.] Under this provision, farmers markets and local food sources could
be shut down, even if they are not the source of the contamination. The
agency can halt all movement of all food in a geographic area. [This is
also a means of total control over the population under the cover of food,
and at any time.]
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- * HR 2749 would empower FDA to make random warrantless
searches of the business records of small farmers and local food producers,
without any evidence whatsoever that there has been a violation. [If these
bills cover all who "hold food" then this allows for taking of
records of anyone at any time on no basis at all.] Even farmers selling
direct to consumers would have to provide the federal government with records
on where they buy supplies, how they raise their crops, and a list of customers.
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- [NAIS for animals and all other foods?]
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- * HR 2749 charges the Secretary of Health and Human Services
with establishing a tracing system for food. Each "person who produces,
manufactures, processes, packs, transports, or holds such food" [Is
this not every home in the US?] would have to "maintain the full pedigree
of the origin and previous distribution history of the food," and
"establish and maintain a system for tracing the food that is interoperable
with the systems established and maintained by other such persons."
The bill does not explain how far the traceback will extend or how it will
be done for multi-ingredient foods. With all these ambiguities, [with all
these ambiguities, it is dangerous, period, separate from the money] it's
far from clear how much it will cost either the farmers or the taxpayers.
[It is massive and absurd and burdensome beyond the capacity of people
to comply - is this not fascism? - so it is a set up for being used to
impose penalties endlessly and/or to eliminate anyone at will.]
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- * HR 2749 creates severe criminal and civil penalties,
including prison terms of up to 10 years and/or fines of up to $100,000
for each violation for individuals. [Does it include judicial review, Congressional
oversight, a defined and limited set of penalties and punishments for a
defined set of "crimes"? Or is it entirely ambiguous and left
to the whim and sole power of "the Administrator"? Who is that
person set to be? Is it Michael Taylor, Monsanto lawyer and executive,
as Food Democracy has said? That is, do these bills set up an agency by
which the entire US food supply will be turned over to the control of a
multinational corporation under WTO regulations (and not to US farmers
and not to US laws under the Constitution), with boundless freedom to do
what it wants, and one infamous for harm to farmers and lack of safety
of food?] If it was not clear before how frightening these bills were,
this small section of provisions, should make their actual fascism clear
now. It goes way beyond "food safety" to absolute control over
farms, animals, food, and us, including our movements and access to food
at all.
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- Action to Take:
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- Contact your Representative now! Ask to speak with the
staffer who handles food issues. Tell them you are opposed to the bill.
Some points to make in telling your Representative why you oppose HR 2749
include:
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- The bill imposes burdensome requirements while not specifically
targeting the industrial food system and food imports, where the real food
safety problems lie. Small farms and local food processors are part of
the solution to food safety; lessening the regulatory burden on them will
improve food safety. The bill gives FDA much more power than it has had
in the past while making the agency less accountable for its actions. HR
2749 needs to be defeated!! Please take action NOW.
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- To contact your Representative, use the finder tool at
www.Congress.org or send a message through the petition system (the petition
will be on our website this evening) athttp://www.ftcldf.org/petitions_new.htm.
Or call the Capitol Switchboard at 202-224-3121.
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- To check the status of HR 2749, go to <http://www.Thomas.gov>www.Thomas.gov
and type "HR 2749Åç in the bill search field.
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- First published June 18, 2009
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- http://gunnyg.wordpress.com/2009/06/18/hr-2749-totalitarian-control-of-the-food-supply/
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