Skip to Content.
Sympa Menu

market-farming - Re: [Market-farming] YES!!!!! Tester amendment is part of Food Safety Bill.... protects 'under $500, 000 sales total'..

market-farming AT lists.ibiblio.org

Subject: Market Farming

List archive

Chronological Thread  
  • From: Richard Stewart <rstewart AT zoomtown.com>
  • To: Market Farming <market-farming AT lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [Market-farming] YES!!!!! Tester amendment is part of Food Safety Bill.... protects 'under $500, 000 sales total'..
  • Date: Sat, 20 Nov 2010 08:56:14 -0500

So the question then is...

Does this mean a family farm that grosses less than 500K in annual sale regardless of wether they sell wholesale or retail?  Or does it mean 500K gross AND just retail, direct to consumer?

Richard Stewart
Carriage House Farm
North Bend, Ohio

An Ohio Century Farm Est. 1855

(513) 967-1106

On Nov 19, 2010, at 9:10 PM, Mike Rock wrote:


U.S. Senator Jon Tester
http://www.tester.senate.gov/Newsroom/pr_111810_foodsafety.cfm

Tester’s amendment for family-scale producers now part of Food Safety Bill

Senator: ‘Time to get this bill passed and strengthen food safety for all’

Thursday, November 18, 2010

(U.S. SENATE) – U.S. Senator Jon Tester has reached an agreement with consumer groups and the bipartisan authors of the
Senate’s Food Safety Bill to include his amendment to protect family-scale food producers from expensive federal
paperwork and unnecessary new regulations.

“This important legislation is shaping up to be a much better bill with the inclusion of my amendment for family-scale
producers, and it protects the jobs of family farmers and ranchers and processers,” Tester said today during a speech to
the Senate.  “It really is time to get this bill passed and strengthen food safety for all Americans.”

Under Tester’s amendment, food producers who sell their goods directly toconsumers and have less than $500,000 in
annual sales would not be subject to the onerous new requirements designed for industrial-scale food producers.
Family-scale producers would, however, continue to be overseen by local andstate food safety and health agencies.

Negotiators have agreed on the following minor revisions to include Tester’s amendment in the Food Safety Bill:

   * New language that gives U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s authority to withdraw an exemption from a farm or
facility that has been associated with a food-borne illness outbreak.
   * The distance from a facility or farm that is eligible to be a local “qualified end-user” has been reduced from
400 miles to 275 miles, or within the same state.

Tester says his amendment is a major victory for family agriculture, safer food, and for the local food movement.

“We deal with consolidation in our energy sector, we deal with consolidation in our banking sector,” Tester said.  “We
have consolidation in our food industry too. The fact is we need to not encourage that consolidation.  I think if we can
get more locally grown food—if we can get producers to connect up the consumers eyeball to eyeball—that’s a positive
thing.  And I don’t want to diminish their ability to do this.”

Although Tester is himself a family-scale grain farmer, Tester’s own farmdoes not qualify under the amendment because
he does not sell grain directly to consumers.

The Senate is currently debating the Food Safety Bill.  A final vote on thebill, including Tester’s amendment, could
happen as early as today.

RESOURCES

   * Tester’s Food Safety Bill resource page is now available online at: http://tester.senate.gov/foodsafety
   * A summary of Tester’s revised amendment is online HERE
   * The latest version of Tester’s amendment is online HERE
   * A YouTube video of Tester’s Senate floor speech is online HERE


Why the Tester Amendment?

“[Family-scale producers] are small. There’s a pride of ownership therethat is real.  They raise food; they don’t raise
a commodity as happens when these operations get bigger and bigger. And there is a direct customer relationship with
that customer or that farmer that means a lot.  And if a mistake is made, which rarely happens, it doesn’t impact
hundreds of thousands of people.  We know exactly where the problem was.  And we know exactly how to fix it.” –Senator
Jon Tester



_______________________________________________
Market-farming mailing list
Market-farming AT lists.ibiblio.org
http://lists.ibiblio.org/mailman/listinfo/market-farming

Market Farming List Archives may be found here:
https://lists.ibiblio.org/sympa/arc/market-farming/
Unsubscribe from the list here (you will need to login in with your email
address and password):
http://lists.ibiblio.org/mailman/options/market-farming




Archive powered by MHonArc 2.6.24.

Top of Page