North American Fruit Explorers mailing list at ibiblio

["Kieran &/or Donna" <holycow@frontiernet.net>]



Here's the fruit related part, but you might want to glance at my comments below.  http://www.lef.org/magazine/mag2006/mar2006_cover_cherries_02.htm

 

Richard Harrison has alerted me to the Food Safety Bill, passed by the House and I guess now the Senate version is being debated.  There is much controversy about these bills, some saying they will help, some saying they will be too much a burden for small farmers and small companies.  Whatever goes into the bills themselves, later on there will be "rules" written by the agency itself and then enforced at it's whim, occasionally against someone that someone else wants to hurt.  But first the bill and the rules, and we do have some input on both if we know what's happening and how to do that input.  It only took 200 letters to APHIS to get it to not implement a new rule that would have forbidden all importation of any new species of plants not already inside the US. 

    Congress was impressed by the effect on American's eating habits that occurred when companies started talking about fiber intake being linked to lower rates of colon cancer.  The FDA had sued Kelloggs for that advertising approach and shut it off, but it was too late, the public had noticed and had started eating a little better as a result.  So Congress passed the Dietary Health and Education Act which said that the FDA could not prevent the advertising of true statements about a food's effect on health.   The agency countered by writing "rules" (which it is allowed to write itself, although the public is allowed to comment on the proposed rules before they are made official laws)  that state it must decide which health claims it approves of.  Years after the law was passed, it had only approved a total of 4 claims of a food's effect on health.  When I last paid attention, over a decade ago, the garlic people had sent in over 90 published studies showing the health benefits of garlic, with no response.  This is the kind of rules and enforcement we can probably expect from the Food Safety Agency when it gets going.  So the more we learn about the Senate bill and the more we input, the more likely the final bill is to help rather than harm US health.   I think that hindering local food production and sales will harm the public health.  Donna