Newsmax - Fruit Tree Farmers’ New ‘Tormentor’: The FDA

The Food and Drug Administration is proposing costly new regulations for growers of apples, pears, and other tree fruits — even though they have a virtually flawless safety record.

“For decades, America’s farmers, ranchers, and fruit growers have become grudgingly accustomed to dealing with onerous regulatory schemes emanating from the Environmental Protection Agency,” according to the CFACT (Committee for a Constructive Tomorrow) website.

“But now the people who grow apples, pears, and other tree fruits have a new tormentor: the Food and Drug Administration,” which is backing standards “that many growers are convinced will put them out of business.”

The new regulations emerge from the Food Safety Modernization Act of 2010, passed by Congress and the Obama administration, which directed the FDA to prevent foodborne illnesses rather than simply react to outbreaks.

This year the FDA designated which items of produce would be included in the new regulations. Those usually consumed raw (including apples, blueberries, bananas, pears, and peaches) would have to abide by the new regulations, and those that are usually cooked or processed (sweet potatoes, black-eyed peas, pumpkins, artichokes, winter squash, etc.) would be exempt, The Wall Street Journal reported.

Growers subject to the new regulations would face an array of new responsibilities, including regular testing of irrigation water, sanitizing canvas fruit-picking bags, and keeping animals away from crops, The Journal explained.

Tree fruit farmers argue that the FDA should focus more on items that have caused deadly outbreaks in the past, such as spinach, instead of items that have never posed a health threat.

An apple farmer in Virginia told The Journal that the compliance costs “would end up getting passed on to the consumer, if we didn’t go out of business first.”

The FDA has said the new requirements would cost American farms about $460 million a year.

Also, some farmers fear that foreign products will not be subject to the same regulations, and foreign competition will drive American farmers out of business.

Farms with average yearly sales of $25,000 or less, and certain other farms that average less than $500,000 in annual sales and sell mostly to consumers within a 275-mile radius, would be exempt from the new requirements, the FDA says.

CFACT reports: “Hoping to avoid the mass shutdown of fruit-tree operations, the Grocery Manufacturers Association and the Fresh Produce Association are urging the FDA to redraft its proposed regulations.”

NRN - Real Science Should Trump Politics

Bill Wilson, the author of the below post, is the President of Americans for Limited Government of which NetRight Nation is part.

From the Washington Examiner:

Remember when President Obama vowed to "restore science to its rightful place?" His inaugural commitment, followed by executive orders, carried a message that methodologically sound science would trump politicized, ideological science.

It turns out, however, that the president's love affair with science isn't quite as clear-cut as it first seemed. Shortly after his inaugural pledge, Obama issued an Executive Order directing his chief science advisor to ensure that administration policies be based on sound science.

The EO called for the appointment of science advisers on credentials rather than political leanings, and transparency about scientific decisions. "The public must be able to trust the science and scientific process informing public policy decisions," he said. One year later, Obama has yet to earn a passing grade on his scientific integrity pledge.

For one thing, Obama simply has not acted, a point driven home by the nonprofit Union of Concerned Scientists, a left-wing advocacy group that normally supports the administration. They point out that Obama last year called for a science strategy to be developed within 120 days of his inauguration.

Yet the Office of Science and Technology Policy has still not finalized a plan, which leads to uneven application among federal agencies.

Other shortcomings are apparent as well. Sunshine is indeed a disinfectant, allowing the public to identify ideologically-based "science" that has driven public policy decisions in the wrong direction.

But too many Freedom of Information Act requests for underlying scientific data used to formulate conclusions still languish too long in federal bureaucracies, effectively denying the public from being able to identify ideologically-driven "science".

Foot-dragging on transparency is one of Obama's greatest failures. He still has not established guidelines for promoting open communication among scientists, the media, policymakers and the public. Nor has it set a process to release all scientific papers early in the policy process, before they might be altered by political appointees.

Another troublesome development involves the scientific advisory panels that are vital in agencies, especially the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). For example, an FDA scientific advisory panel was directed by Congress last year to make recommendations on the impact of menthol in cigarettes. It's a question for which sound scientific studies would seem to be needed.

Yet, according to one Wall Street analyst, some members of the administration-appointed panel have already come out for a menthol ban. And yet others have what appears to be a clear conflict of interest as they have worked for pharmaceutical firms that sell smoking cessation products. Given these viewpoints and conflicts, it's questionable whether the public could trust their analysis.

It's a bit like having a Red Sox fan call balls and strikes at a Yankees baseball game

To "restore science to its proper place," the Administration still must convince the public that it has washed ideologically biased science from government and that appointees to scientific positions throughout government are dedicated to methodologically sound science, not to a pre-determined agenda.

It may be that the Obama administration never really had any intention of doing what it discussed with lofty rhetoric in its executive orders. If that is the case, substituting left-wing "science" under the ruse of "sound science" is no way to ensure that the public trusts the scientific process, and ultimately for the Obama Administration trust is the issue.

Bill Wilson is the president of Americans for Limited Government.

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Adam R. Bitely
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