America's New Farmers: Policy Innovations and Opportunities

The Drake Forum on America's New Farmers: Policy Innovations and Opportunities will take place Thursday and Friday March 4-5, 2010, at the L'Enfant Plaza Hotel in Washington DC. This two day meeting will bring together policy advocates, government officials, and beginning farmers from across the nation to consider how best to support policies creating the next generation of America's farmers. Drake University is pleased to have the financial support of USDA Risk Management Agency, the Farm Credit Council, and others in making the Forum possible. A dozen agricultural groups and institutions involved with new and beginning farmers are cooperating with Drake on this initiative. Registration for the conference is now open and can be found on the conference website.

The Forum will begin with a panel of new farmers talking about their hopes and needs for public policy. Discussion sessions are planned on: land access and availability; innovations in finance and credit; lessons from beginning farmer efforts; new farmer training and education programs; opportunities for new farmer communities; and markets and sustainable rural revitalization. The closing plenary will address the road ahead in identifying opportunities for national policy action.

Senior leaders from Congress and USDA have been invited to provide keynote presentations. A local food reception and a new farmer film festival are planned for the evening of March 4th.

Forum organizer, Professor Neil Hamilton is working to finalize the agenda of speakers and panels and reports that he is pleased to have several new national organizations joining Drake as co-sponsors for this event. Anyone with questions or suggestions for the Forum should e-mail americasnewfarmer@drake.edu or call 515-271-4956.

U.S. Food Safety System In Serious Disrepair

More than 50% of food manufacturers are unaware of their legal obligation to provide the FDA with updated contact information that the FDA relies on to deal with emergencies, such as Salmonella or other forms of food contamination. According to a Report released yesterday by The Department of Health and Human Services, Office of Inspector General, federal auditors found that approximately 48% of surveyed manufacturers failed to provide the FDA with accurate contact information and approximately 25% provided no emergency contact information at all.

The GAO Report explains:

Each year, more than 300,000 Americans are hospitalized and 5,000 die after consuming contaminated foods and beverages. In the event of an outbreak of a foodborne illness, FDA is responsible for finding the source of the contamination and helping to remove the contaminated food products from the food supply chain. Recent outbreaks of foodborne illness involving peanut butter, peppers, and spinach have raised serious questions about FDA’s ability to protect the Nation’s food supply.

The Public Health Security and Bioterrorism Preparedness and Response Act of 2002 requires certain food facilities to register with FDA. The purpose of registration is to provide FDA with sufficient and reliable information about food facilities. This information enables FDA to quickly locate facilities during an outbreak of foodborne illness and to locate these facilities for inspection.

FDA requires each domestic food facility to provide information for the registry, including (1) contact information (i.e., name, full address, telephone number, and all trade names under which the facility conducts business); (2) contact information for the parent company; (3) contact information for the owner or operator of the facility; and (4) an emergency contact telephone number. If there is a change in a facility’s information, such as a new name or address, the facility must provide FDA with the updated information within 60 days. The information provided by facilities is stored in a database called the FDA Unified Registration and Listing System .....

Hat tip: Bill Marler at Marler Blog.

Hunger Crisis Among Those Who Harvest Our Food

Consider the irony of this when you select fresh fruit or vegetables at the supermarket.

In Hard Times Even Harder, National Public
Radio reports that the children of migrant farm laborers inn North Carolina are more than 3 times more likely to be of "food insecure." Unemployment in the migrant labor sector has exacerbated farm labor poverty in recent months.

"Nearly a million migrant children crisscross the United States with their families from harvest to harvest and job to job. In North Carolina, migrant families struggle to find work and many rely on schools for food and clothing. The people who run North Carolina's migrant program say the living conditions and financial hardships for migrant laborers are the worst in memory."

Agricultural Law Information

The December issue of The Agricultural Law Brief, published by Ross Pifer Director of The Agricultural Law Resource and Reference Center at Penn State Law was just released. This issue contains information on the following topics:

(1) Litigation filed by Dimock landowners against a natural gas company for environmental contamination;
(2) The Food Safety Modernization Act of 2009;
(3) Pennsylvania Supreme Court order in ACRE litigation;
(4) Chesapeake Bay Protection and Restoration draft strategy; and
(5) World Summit on Food Security.

The Brief is available on the Center's website.