Senator to Introduce ‘Common Sense’ Amendments to Food Safety Bill

WASHINGTON, D.C. – Citing unique issues that face family food producers, Senator Jon Tester will introduce amendments to the upcoming Food Safety Modernization Act to exempt small-scale businesses from expensive federal regulations and red tape.

The Senate is expected to debate the Food Safety Modernization Act this week.  The bill aims to prevent food-borne illnesses by cracking down on food processing plants, requiring better inspection, recordkeeping, and testing.
As written, however, the bill would add a new layer of regulation to even the smallest food producers.  The same rules that would apply to large, corporate food companies would also apply to family food producers, which are already regulated at the state and local level.

“When you buy some vegetables or a jar of jam from your local farmers’ market, you’re buying the cleanest, freshest, healthiest food available, directly from the producer,” Tester said.  “Family farms and ranches have enough hurdles to jump over just trying to make a living. They don’t need expensive, redundant regulation that could put them out of business.”

Tester today announced two amendments he plans to introduce to the Food Safety Modernization Act: That producers that add value to food through processing and whose adjusted gross income is less than $500,000 per year, and producers who sell their food directly to market (such as farmers’ markets) be subject only to state and local regulation—not new expensive federal regulations designed for industrial food factories. Tester praised the goals of the overall bill, but warned against over-regulation of small, local producers.

“Let’s face it, dangerous food-borne outbreaks don’t start with family agriculture,” Tester said.  “Food produced on that scale shouldn’t be subject to the same expensive federal regulations as some big factory that mass produces food for the entire country.”