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U.S. Easy Target For Tainted Foods
By Diana Galban
Today more of our food is imported, but much less of it is inspected by the Food and Drug Administration—only about one percent, according to Reuters. Since countries like Japan, Canada and the European Union enforce stricter food inspection requirements; have tainted foods found the U.S. market an easier path?
The numerous food safety alerts and recalls have American consumers worried about the food they buy, and who can blame them? There are 76 million people, who get sick each year from food illnesses, and more than 300,000 are hospitalized and 5,000 die, according to the Department of Health and Human Services.
Without labels to tell us which country the food came from, we end up in a supermarket guessing game. For years the American consumer has pleaded for a “country of origin label” law, also know as COOL, but special interests groups have managed to sidetrack any legislation relating to COOL.
Earlier this year, the FDA detained about 850 shipments of grains, fish, vegetables, nuts, spices, oils and other imported foods for issues ranging from filth to unsafe food coloring to contamination with pesticides to salmonella—but that was only within the 1.3 percent that was inspected. The other 98.7 percent not inspected was distributed to the market.
It’s important that the consumers feel confident with their choices and are informed about the lack of farming laws in other countries when purchasing food imports. All of Europe and most industrialized nations require mandatory “country of origin” labels on food. The U.S. Congress enacted a requirement that food be labeled with the “country of origin” in the 2002 Farm Act, but it has been postponed several times.
According to Consumer Reports, 92 percent of Americans want to know the “country of origin” when shopping. However, The New York Times says meatpackers may not want the public to know that the majority of the meat is imported.
The U.S. could follow the example of other countries’ labeling systems, like the European Union, which is mandated by law to examine their imports and includes specific label requirements such as name, ingredients, storage conditions and, most importantly, place of origin and process used in manufacturing.
Both the House of Representatives and Congress have legislation proposed on food import inspections and “country of origin labels.” Why not remind your government representatives that the T-shirt you’re wearing has a country of origin label; isn’t the apple you eat just as important?
Contact your State Representative “country of origin” (COOL) labels
http://www.house.gov/writerep/
Your state senators:
http://www.senate.gov/general/contact_information/senators_cfm.cfm
Keep up to date on Food Alerts and Recalls:
www.fda.gov/opacom/7alerts.html. Check the FDA’s official site for Recalls, Market Withdrawals and Safety Alerts
Email Diana your thoughts: outloud@outloud.com