CALPIRG's Consumer Associate, Emily Clayton

By Emily Clayton,CALPIRG consume rassociate.

In California, we care a lot about the food we eat. At the grocery store, we carefully inspect our fruits and vegetables for freshness; we scrutinize labels for fat and cholesterol content; we keep an eye out for organic and California-grown signs. At the polls, we support measures like Prop 65 that give us fair warning about toxic chemicals in our food. When newscasters talk about problems like mad cow, our ears perk up and we’re reminded of the many ways the safety of our food can be threatened.

Unfortunately, the commercial food processing industry and some members of Congress are working to add another threat to that list– rollbacks of some of our most crucial food safety protections.

Despite the strong opposition of virtually every major consumer and environmental group in the country, special interests are pushing ahead with their plan to dismantle the way we regulate the safety of our food supply.

CALPIRG is joining with allies at the state and federal level to ensure that California maintains the right to protect our food.

FOOD SAFETY—Californians care about the food they eat, but our food safety laws are in danger of being eliminated.

Rollbacks On Prop 65
For each of the last three sessions of Congress, Sen. Richard Burr (N.C.) has introduced legislation that would create a single food notification, labeling and warning system for the entire country.

This legislation, in its various forms, would preempt virtually all comes law, the bulk of California’s unique food safety laws would be preempted by federal law and unenforceable without special federal permission.

These proposed rollbacks are troubling not just because they trample over California’s right to protect its food supply, but also because they cut against the logic of the entire system of food monitoring in the United States.

Because the majority of food-related problems are localized in particular regions or states, state governments traditionally have been responsible for ensuring the safety of the food supply and for informing consumers about food safety issues.

Each year, state and local governments conduct 80 percent of food besafety inspections that occur in the United States.

The legislation proposed by Congress would take this local issue and place it in the hands of a less experienced, less responsive, and further removed federal bureaucracy.

In their role as guardians of food safety, state governments have enacted a wide range of laws that are often more stringent than federal law or cover areas altogether ignored by federal law.

These state laws range from regulations about salmon labeling in Alaska to nutritional requirements for grits in Alabama to apple packaging standards in Rhode Island.

California’s Food Safety Laws
Through legislative action and the citizen initiative process, California has become a national leader in ensuring food safety. We have strong notification laws to alert consumers about the presence of certain toxic chemicals, tough thresholds for food and color additives, and strict labeling requirements for products like shellfish.

As a result, California has been able to respond with speed and agility to threats to our food supply.

This federal proposal threatens critical components of our food safety net. The primary target of the law, long a bane to food manufacturers, is Prop 65.

Prop 65, adopted by voters in 1986, requires warnings on food and other products if they contain significant levels of chemicals known to cause cancer or birth defects.

In their fight against the Burr bill last year, members of California’s congressional delegation underscored the important role that Prop 65 has played in protecting public health in the state.

“While Proposition 65 has resulted in some warnings, it has more importantly created a market incentive to remove dangerous chemicals from foods and to bring safe foods to market,” the delegation argued. “The California attorney general reports that Proposition 65 has been a useful supplement to federal standards.”

This market incentive is precisely what irks the food manufacturers. Wanting neither a warning about toxic chemicals on their food or pressure to produce safer products, they have chosen to do an end-run around the wishes of the voters by eliminating the law at the federal level.

FOOD SAFETY—Proposition 65, one of California’s most important food safety preventative measures, has resulted in warnings about toxic contamination in some food products, including fish.

CALPIRG Takes On The Issue
CALPIRG is taking on this issue at both the state and federal levels. On a trip to Washington in February, CALPIRG’s Steve Blackledge, Jennette Gayer, Emily Clayton and Merriah Fairchild met with members of California’s congressional delegation to build a strong basis of opposition to these rollbacks. CALPIRG’s Jennette Gayer worked with Sen. Dianne Feinstein to circulate a letter to other members of Congress warning them about the dangers of this rollback and asking them to commit to opposing it.

In addition to our efforts to defeat the problematic Burr bill in Congress, CALPIRG’s advocates are also working to enact stronger standards for genetically engineered food and crops, unless the following are assured: independent safety testing demonstrates they have no harmful effects on human health or the environment; the public’s right to know about field tests is improved, and any products commercialized are labeled; and the biotechnology corporations that manufacture them are held accountable for any harm they may cause.

The Facts On GE Crops
To build support for our position, in April of this year we released Raising Risk: Field Testing of Genetically Engineered Crops in the United States.

The report found that:

• Between 1987 and 2004, USDA received 11,090 applications for field releases of genetically engineered crops. Overall, USDA served as a rubber stamp for applications to conduct field tests, rejecting only 3.6 percent of all applications submitted.

• As of December 2004, 14 states and territories have hosted more than 1,000 field test sites for genetically engineered crops. The top four are Hawaii (5,413), Illinois (5,092), Puerto Rico (3,483) and California (1,964).

• The 10 crops authorized for the most field releases are corn, soybean, cotton, potato, tomato, wheat, creeping bentgrass, alfalfa, beet and rice.

• The percentage of field tests conducted with genes considered confidential business information has increased dramatically, rising from 0 percent in 1987 to 70 percent in 2004.