CALIFORNIA: Poorly written food safety plan threatens small local farmers - (San Jose Mercury News)
November 18, 2007 – 7:50 pmhttp://www.mercurynews.com/search/ci_7479484?IADID=Search-www.mercurynews.com-www.mercurynews.com&nclick_check=1
According to this story, Americans are on the edge of losing wonderful varieties of lettuce brought to our plates by the small and determined family farmer.
It’s the latest threat to our palates by big agricultural interests. The Western Growers Association (www.wga.com) recently implemented a uniform set of growing standards called the Leafy Green Marketing Agreement in its effort to recover from the spinach E. coli outbreak of 2006.
The story says that if the new farming production standards become mandatory for all leafy green growers, small farmers who worked for decades to bring back these flavors could be forced to stop growing leafy greens. The agreement can and should apply standards to large industrial producers, who process mountain of pre-cut, bagged leafy greens, to keep that product safe. But it should not apply to the small farmers who sell loose greens directly to farmers markets, chefs and companies like Bon Appetit […]
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http://www.extension.iastate.edu/foodsafety/news/fsnews.cfm?newsid=22592
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