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Virginia Tech helps stop the struggle with on-campus food insecurity WFXRtv.com Article From & Read More ( Virginia Tech helps stop the struggle with on-campus food insecurity - WFXRtv.com )
by Andrew Alonzo | aalonzo@claremont-courier.com
For the past several weeks, chef Phil Lee has gotten up in the early morning hours at his Los Angeles home to make the 33-mile drive to Second Street in the Claremont Village. Each time he’s made the sometimes 45-minute trek, chef Lee, the founder and owner of Honeybird, has gotten one step closer to making his third southern comfort food joint a reality.
After months of labor and reconfiguring the former vegan restaurant that once occupied the space, Lee’s newest Honeybird location is finally set to open in Claremont, next Friday, October 8.
“Southern hospitality and southern comfort food … that’s kind of what Honeybird is in a nutshell … Fried chicken and all of the classic southern comfort sides like mashed potatoes, collard greens, mac and cheese, biscuits and stuff like that — the whole nine yards,” chef Lee said on Tuesday.
And Honeybird offers all that and more, including their crowd favorite banana cream pies. While his restaurant specializes in crispy, fried chicken, chef Lee insisted that the southern food joint will have something on the menu for every Claremonter to enjoy.
“If there’s a group of four people that come in, some of them might be like ‘dude I’m totally for the fried chicken,’ and we might have a vegan or vegetarian [among them], we have these salads that say ‘Hey, you’re all included as well,’” chef Lee said. “We try to cook with the seasons, too, so we’ll have seasonal salads and sides that are fresh. We have sandwiches, too, ‘cause it’s a thing.”
Everything on the menu is made fresh and from scratch daily by Honeybird’s kitchen staff and incoming chef, Daniel Gee, and the chicken is locally sourced from Los Angeles Poultry. Chef Gee said that Honeybird’s original La Cañada location alone can go through up to 2,000 pounds of chicken per week.
Fried chicken has played an important role in chef Lee’s life. He shared two childhood memories that revolve around him and his family eating the fried bird.
The first memory was when he realized for the first time that his mom made fried chicken for dinner at home, which blew his seven-year-old mind. “I was so used to going to KFC, Popeyes and places like that and I remember when my mom made it, it was bomb!”
The second memory was when he took a trip to South Korea to visit his grandmother and the pair went out to get a bite to eat. Stopping at a local poultry vendor, a young Lee saw a live chicken get prepped and fried right before his eyes. “It was kind of traumatizing but at the same time it was kind of cool ‘cause I saw the whole process from start to finish and him frying it off. And again, it was like, ‘This is so good,’ and it’s so fresh.
“Those two things always kind of always stuck in my mind in terms of like fried chicken. But I didn’t know at the age of 10 or 11 that I wanted to do fried chicken.”
After graduating from culinary school in 2005, Lee began working in the restaurant industry, training under some of the most high-profile chefs in and around Los Angeles for a decade. When it came time to establish a name for himself on the restaurant scene, he said something just spoke to him about southern comfort food.
“I wanted to set out to be my own man and do food that’s relatable. Especially in time like during COVID when people want comfort food. Whether you’re happy, sad or whatever spectrum of emotions, comfort food is comfort food. That’s how we ended up landing on this,” he said. “Conceptually, whenever I think of Honeybird, I think of my own family and my kids, like where would I like to go out to eat, and it’s always that local, neighborhood restaurant.”
Lee opened his first Honeybird location in La Cañada in 2016, five minutes from where he grew up. His second location at the University of Southern California’s Village came two years later.
Both Lee’s landlord and his wife, a frequent Claremont shopper, had urged him to expand Honeybird to the east, but it wasn’t until he actually visited the city himself that he saw potential for a third location. He said the city’s classic, nostalgic vibe reminded him of his first location and was what eventually sold him on the area.
Knowing that Honeybird has competition in the fried chicken department around Claremont, Lee said that his staff members’ personability and the restaurant’s overall great food and setting are what sets it apart. “For us, we try to treat customers as guests, like we’re inviting them into our house,” chef Lee said.
Lee wants his stores to maintain their small-town, mom-and-pop business feel, and to not only serve great food with a great attitude, but also to give back to the community through hosting fundraisers and supporting local schools and foundations.
“We want to be woven into the fabric of a community…We want to be like around [for a long time],” he said. “‘I grew up on Some Crust,’ people would tell us that and yeah it would be cool to be here for long enough where it’s like…‘I remember going here as a college kid and now I bring my kids here.’ That’s the hope.”
For more information, contact the store at (909) 447-2010 or visit www.honeybirdla.com. Honeybird is located at 175 North Indian Hill Boulevard, Suite 102A, in between I Like Pie Bakeshop and Jamba Juice.
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Food Assistance: State corrects earlier information | News | thechronicleonline.com St. Helens Chronicle Article From & Read More ( Food Assistance: State corrects earlier information | News | thechronicleonline.com - St. Helens Chronicle )
The U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) National Institute of Food and Agriculture (NIFA) announced it is investing $10 million for 21 grants to develop and implement food safety and Food Safety Modernization Act-related training, education, extension outreach and technical assistance for food processors and farmers with small to mid-size operations.
“The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reports 48 million people in this country get sick from foodborne illness each year. Education and outreach are essential for ensuring our food supply is safe from the field to the table,” said NIFA Director Dr. Carrie Castille.
She continued, “NIFA’s integrated approach to enhancing food safety practices includes multi-state coordination, community outreach and collaborative projects that enable small farm operators, wholesalers and small-scale processors to get the support they need. This program helps deliver critical trainings and resources that equip our small business owners with tools to provide safe, high-quality food, strengthen their businesses and contribute to national nutrition security.”
Additional communities supported through this Food Safety Outreach Competitive Grant Program include beginning farmers, socially disadvantaged farmers, veteran farmers and ranchers, and small fresh fruit and vegetable merchant wholesalers.
Awards are made under three categories: Multistate Education and Training Projects, Community Outreach Projects and Collaborative Engagement Supplements. In FY 2021, NIFA made 13 Collaborative Education and Training Project awards, four Community Outreach Project awards and four Regional Center awards.
Examples of the 21 funded FSOP grants include:
WHAT’S FOR dinner? The answer matters, at every level. Food connects the personal to the planetary. Agriculture uses half the world’s habitable land and accounts for more than 30% of global emissions. Food production links the great biogeochemical cycles of carbon and nitrogen, both on a planetary level and also in specific factories that combine natural gas with nitrogen and oxygen from the air to produce agricultural fertiliser on the one hand, and carbon dioxide for use in food processing on the other. When one such factory in Teesside, in northern England, recently threatened to shut down because of high natural-gas prices, the government had to step in to prevent food supply chains from collapsing.
Globally, food prices have risen in 13 of the past 15 months and are close to their peak of 2011, owing to poor weather, pandemic-related disruption and fallout from a swine-flu outbreak in China in 2018. In the longer term, the food system faces pressure from climate change, population growth and a shift towards more Westernised, meat-heavy diets.
Fortunately, technologies are emerging that promise to produce food in new ways, in large volumes with less inhumane factory farming and a lower environmental footprint. These range from bioreactors that grow meat to indoor “vertical” farms and new ways of producing fish. Such techniques could make a huge difference. Three-quarters of agricultural land is used for livestock, for example, so it is easy to see how steaks made from plant-based protein, or grown in vats from cells, could greatly reduce factory farming and land and water use, and produce fewer emissions.
Just because it is possible to make food in new ways does not mean people will be willing to eat it, however. Given food’s cultural importance, and the fact that it is ingested into the body, conservatism and scepticism are common reactions to new foodstuffs and production processes. In 17th-century Europe many people were loth to eat a new vegetable called the potato because it was not mentioned in the Bible, or because they feared it caused leprosy. Today, many European countries ban the cultivation and sale of genetically modified crops, even though they are widely grown and eaten elsewhere. And although much of the world considers insects a mouth-watering treat (and locust-eating is endorsed in the Bible), the very idea revolts many Western consumers.
At the same time as novel foods are shunned, traditional foods and farming lore are venerated. In California the fanciest restaurants aspire to recreate the humble diet of the Tuscan peasant. Many Western consumers are willing to pay extra for food produced by organic farming, in effect a historical re-enactment of pre-20th-century agriculture, because it avoids “chemicals”. (Everything is made of chemicals.)
Yet supposedly timeless food traditions are often shallower than they seem. In the “Columbian exchange” in the 16th century, food crops from the Americas rapidly spread around the world. Tomatoes and polenta, staples of the Italian diet, are American in origin and were unknown to the Romans or to Dante. Potatoes were eventually widely adopted in Europe (the invention of French fries helped). It is hard to imagine many Asian cuisines without chili peppers, but they too are American. Coffee from Arabia and tea from China were unknown in Europe before the 17th century.
The new foods and processes on offer today present opportunities to create delicious and sustainable new traditions. Western consumers should put aside their reservations about eating crickets and give plant-based burgers, 3D-printed steaks and vat-grown artificial tuna a try. Regulators, especially in Europe and America, should streamline their processes for approving cultured meat, be more open to gene-editing crops (as Britain said it would be this week), and speed up approval of edible insects for animal feed and human consumption. A wholesale reimagining of the food system is needed. But that will be possible only if both consumers and regulators are prepared to be more daring about what to eat for dinner. ■
This article appeared in the Leaders section of the print edition under the headline "Working up an appetite"
Article From & Read More ( New ways to make food are coming—but will consumers bite? - The Economist )
Changing the world is an ambitious goal, but few act on this desire or know where to start. For Atlanta local Iris Wickham (24C) and her friend Natalia Szalay (24C), their starting point was Emory University’s Dobbs Common Table (DCT).
In 2020, Wickham and Szalay revived the dormant “Emory Food Chain” organization, which aims to reduce food waste from the DCT by redistributing excess meals to the metro Atlanta area. The Emory Food Chain — completely student led — fights against food insecurity and scarcity in Atlanta. Wickham and Szalay have specifically focused on smaller neighborhoods and cities where they believe they can have the greatest impact. Currently, they are establishing a relationship with the city of Clarkston, which has been dubbed “Ellis Island South” for its large population of refugees and immigrants. About 31% of the Clarkston community lives below the poverty line, and many face food insecurity.
“Our initiatives focus on taking food in the dining halls, packaging it and delivering it to communities in need in Atlanta,” Wickham said. “Predominantly low-income communities that face food insecurity in some capacity.”
Wickham and Szalay utilized the help of enthusiastic volunteers to collect excess meals from the DCT and deliver them. Using assembly-line like techniques, Wickham and Szalay packed leftover food from the dining hall into to-go containers, passing along deliveries to driving volunteers. The meals were then taken to the Clarkston Community Center for distribution.
Their work allows Emory community members to connect with one of the most diverse cities in the U.S., and Wickham recognizes the importance of this interaction.
“Emory can unconsciously be a bubble, so it’s easy to think of Atlanta as an overall wealthy city, but it’s extremely diverse in socioeconomic backgrounds and cultures and races,” Wickham said. “There are a lot of pockets of Atlanta that are very different from Emory. It’s important to bridge the gap between them.”
The efforts put forward by the Food Chain reciprocate back to Emory as well, since the redistribution of excess DCT food reduces food waste on campus. By March 2021, the organization had delivered over 1,000 meals to food pantries in Atlanta and utilized 3,000 donated Dooley Dollars to supplement their meal deliveries.
The mission to engage with the greater Atlanta area also had bonus effects for Wickham and Szalay. Due to the nature of the Food Chain, the two have been able to work closely with the DCT staff, whom they are very appreciative of.
“Sometimes we think of them as just one group because we only see them at work, when really they have different passions and different backgrounds and different reasons for being here,” Wickham said.
Even the students at Emory who aren’t directly participating in the Food Chain movement are catching on to the altruistic pursuit of the organization. Isabelle Munson (24C) has valued the impact the organization has made.
“Seeing the amount of food that’s available versus the amount that’s eaten, it’s comforting knowing it’s going somewhere where it will be eaten and appreciated,” Munson said.
During the past year, the organization has also been challenged and limited by the pandemic. Logistical questions, such as how to safely transport food from campus to donation spots, continue to arise. However, Wickham and Szalay have maneuvered through obstacles with solutions such as sterilizing cars before transportation and ensuring social distancing while distributing meals.
Wickham and Szalay have taken the remnants of an old club and successfully turned it into an agent of change. Even though the two stepped into leadership roles during a difficult semester, and their first semesters at Emory, they were both passionate about jumping at the opportunity to impact the community.
“A changemaker is someone who takes what they have and uses it in a metamorphosis to create change,” Szalay said. “They are driven, empathetic and resourceful.”
Lena Bodenhamer (24C) is from Fort Collins, Colorado.
Article From & Read More ( Chain of Change: Students Fight Against Food Insecurity - The Emory Wheel )[unable to retrieve full-text content]
Mass food distribution in Albany today NEWS10 ABC Article From & Read More ( Mass food distribution in Albany today - NEWS10 ABC )/cloudfront-us-east-1.images.arcpublishing.com/gray/TM46E3VQH4MVJDQIHXRDMC5N7Q.com)
The pandemic is still having an impact on local families trying to keep food on the table.
Now, a local nonprofit is expanding its reach in Palm Beach County.
Boca Helping Hands is launching a new assistance program for families in west Delray Beach
It is a portion of the city that is located south of Atlantic Avenue along Jog Road that has been declared a "food desert" by the USDA, which means families living here have limited access to affordable and healthy food options.
That's why the nonprofit is opening up a food pantry here at the Bethel Evangelical Baptist Church.
Starting next week, the church will serve as a drive-thru food distribution site twice a week.
In addition to the food distribution, Boca Helping Hands is also expanding its financial assistance program to families in west Delray Beach. Residents in need can now apply for rent utilities and child care expenses through its resource center.
The organization said it is looking forward to setting up a permanent lifeline for struggling families in the community.
"We really want to bring the food to the people where they're living, where they need it. There's a lot of people who also can't make it to one of our other pantries, and it's a waste of gasoline to have them drive to Boynton Beach or east Boca or west Boca, so we're going to bring it to them. And it's very important that no one in Palm Beach County go to bed hungry," said Bill Harper, executive director at Boca Helping Hands.
The drive-thru food distribution starts next week at Bethel Evangelical Baptist Church, which is located at 5780 W Atlantic Ave.
Below is the food distribution schedule:
It's open to all Palm Beach County residents.
Visit the Boca Helping Hands website to learn more.
Scripps Only Content 2021
Article From & Read More ( Boca Helping Hands launching food pantry in west Delray Beach - wflx )Food-grade waxes are applied to many produce items before storage and distribution to control postharvest decay and extend shelf life. But relatively little is known about how different waxes and the waxing step impact microbial food safety.
In her project funded by the Center for Produce Safety (CPS), “Waxing of whole produce and its involvement in and impact on microbial food safety,” Luxin Wang, Ph.D. an associate professor with the University of California-Davis, is studying the microbial food safety of waxing produce.
Wang hopes to address the knowledge gaps related to waxing produce.
“We hope to provide the industry with information about how waxes contribute to the microbial safety of fresh produce by using lemons and oranges as model products,” she said.
In addition, Wang said, the results could be used by individual packinghouses to support the development of their food safety plans or risk assessments.
The studies objectives
Early results
For objective one, the team obtained four storage waxes and 15 finishing waxes from industry collaborators. They evaluated the chemical and microbial characteristics of these waxes as well as their impact on pathogen survival.
“The waxes had a wide range of pH from 8-13 and varying compositions,” Wang said. “Among them, two storage waxes and one finishing wax had background populations of microorganisms.”
The team observed that the behavior of pathogens inoculated into the waxes depended upon the pathogen type, the type of wax and the storage temperature.
“In general, Listeria survived better than Salmonella, and both pathogens survived better at 4 degrees Celsius than 22 (degrees) Celsius and in diluted waxes than in undiluted waxes,” she said. “Since storage waxes are used in diluted form, information obtained from objective one will help the industry decide how to better store their unused or used storage and finishing waxes.”
For the second objective, storage waxes will be applied to lemons inoculated with pathogens and then stored at 4 degrees Celsius or 22 degrees Celsius for specific periods of time mimicking storage conditions at lemon packinghouses.
“For the first two objectives, we would like to mimic two scenarios. The first is to evaluate what happens if the fruit is exposed to contaminated waxes,” Wang said. “In the second scenario, the fruit arrives at the packinghouse already contaminated on the surface before the wax is applied.”
The team is just beginning objective two.
About CPS: The Center for Produce Safety is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization. CPS is a collaborative partnership that leverages the combined expertise of industry, government and the scientific and academic communities to focus on providing research needed to continually enhance food safety. This level of collaboration allows CPS to fill the knowledge gaps on produce food safety and address both research priorities and immediate industry needs.
(To sign up for a free subscription to Food Safety News, click here)
Article From & Read More ( Project looks at impact of food-grade waxes on fresh produce food safety - Food Safety News )CMX and FDA-Challenge Winner Mojix Partner to Launch First Open Access Food Traceability Platform
Partnership provides the most comprehensive supply chain management solution for supplier compliance, quality and food safety; offers item-level traceability and transparency to speed inventory, incident and recall management for food service, hospitality and retail businesses.
San Diego, Calif. – September 28, 2021 – CMX, a leading provider of cloud-based Enterprise Quality Management Software (EQMS), and Mojix, a global leader in item-level intelligence solutions, today announced a strategic partnership for advancing comprehensive end-to-end traceability and food safety, with Mojix launching the first open data access, item-level food traceability platform, and CMX being the first solution provider to integrate with the new platform.
As part of the agreement, CMX will integrate the Mojix ytem™ platform – selected by the U.S. Food & Drug Administration (FDA) as a winner in a recent traceability challenge – with the CMX1 platform, used by leading brands worldwide. The integration gives CMX customers access to lightning-fast item-level traceability and visibility into inventory and item lifecycle across supply chain partners and retail locations. This further speeds and automates the resolution of product incidents, withdrawals and recalls managed on the CMX1 platform.
Mojix’s SaaS-based solution enables the tracing of Key Data Elements (KDEs) and Critical Tracking Events (CTEs) along the supply chain, allowing item-level and lot code traceability when outbreaks of food-borne illness or recalls arise. This level of traceability meets the proposed rule 204 of the FDA’s Food Safety Modernization Act (FSMA) and facilitates fail-proof quality control via the systematic review of origin, destination and freshness at each stage of the supply chain.
“We’re excited to be making our proposal to the FDA a reality with this partnership. Together with CMX, we’ll usher in a new era of operational efficiency, speed and accuracy when it comes to inventory, incident and recall management,” said Dan Doles, CEO for Mojix. “The partnership and integration with CMX, the leading expert in digitizing and automating supplier management, food quality and safety processes, is a gamechanger for food service, hospitality and retail businesses and is, ultimately, focused on benefitting the end consumer.”
According to Mitch Porche, CMX CEO, Ytem’s specific capabilities for quick-serve restaurant (QSR) and grocery store applications align well with CMX and its customer base. “We’re extremely pleased to join the Mojix program as the first partner, and to bring their FDA award-winning solution and its enhanced capabilities to our customers,” said Porche. “Their architecture, technical approach, and focus on open access to item-level inventory management and traceability allows for more flexibility and easier adoption than other competitors with closed ecosystems. As a seamlessly integrated extension of the CMX1 platform, the joint solution offers an exceptional approach to managing product quality and food safety, providing brands the opportunity to improve responsiveness, ensure customer safety, and mitigate risk when resolving product-related incidents and executing product recalls.”
CMX customers using the integrated solution will also benefit from less food waste and less impact on food costs when executing a recall. Item-level tracking and end-to-end traceability give them precision information on lot code, date and time stamps for production runs and more, eliminating the need to dispose of or destroy more product than necessary.
Mojix Selected as One of 12 FDA Food Safety Winners Worldwide
Earlier this month, Mojix was selected by the U.S. Food & Drug Administration (FDA) as one of 12 worldwide winners in the New Era of Smarter Food Safety Low- or No-Cost Tech-enabled Traceability Challenge, which encourages the development of cost-effective traceability solutions for human and animal food operations of all sizes. More information on a September 28 FDA webinar showcasing Mojix and the other winners can be found here.
Ytem works by bringing together manufacturers, processors, distribution centers, wholesalers, and other supply chain partners who attach their own specific product or ingredient data in the form of KDEs and CTEs to a digital ID. Each of these stakeholders is able to see previous events in Ytem before registering a new one, making the process fully transparent and visible to all parties with access privileges. Mojix's technology-agnostic platform allows for a variety of data capture, sharing and synchronization methods including barcodes, QR codes, RFID, NFC, APIs, GS1, and more.
When product recalls are activated through CMX1, the platform uses this data to quickly identify the location of specified products within the supply chain and across retail locations to automatically create distribution lists for communications. Customers will have the option for pinpoint communications or broader communication depending on data availability.
About CMX
Leading brands and service providers including Burger King, Arby’s, Sonic, Taco Bell, Firehouse Subs, Captain D’s, Hasbro, Two Men and a Truck, and Bureau Veritas trust CMX’s cloud-based Enterprise Quality Management Software (EQMS), CMX1, to help them achieve and maintain Quality and Operational Excellence. For over a decade, CMX has led the market with the most comprehensive, user-friendly, cloud-based EQMS platform for retail, food, consumer goods, and service providers. It’s the only enterprise solution to effectively combine supply chain quality and operational excellence into a single, fully configurable operating platform.
For more information, please visit www.cmx1.com or call 1-858.997.2140.
About Mojix
Mojix is a global leader in item-level intelligence solutions for Manufacturing, Supply Chain and Retail. The firm is leading the way in item-level traceability solutions utilizing its high security, globally scalable cloud-hosted SaaS platform. Founded in 2004, the company has deep domain expertise in serialization technologies such as RFID, NFC, and print based marking systems. Mojix builds business intelligence from event-triggered actions tracking billions of unique identities, following item lifecycles from source to shelf. Companies can leverage the seamlessly integrated data to increase their sales and operational efficiency, reduce major risks and enhance their customer experience. With offices across the US, Latin America and Europe, Mojix is now a recognized expert in end-to-end, item-level track and trace, product authentication and automated inventory management.
Learn more at www.mojix.com
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About CMX Leading brands and service providers including Burger King, Arby’s, Sonic, Taco Bell, Firehouse Subs, Captain D’s, Hasbro, Two Men and a Truck, and Bureau Veritas trust CMX’s cloud-based Enterprise Quality Management Software (EQMS), CMX1, to help them achieve and maintain Quality and Operational Excellence. For over a decade, CMX has led the market with the most comprehensive, user-friendly, cloud-based EQMS platform for retail, food, consumer goods, and service providers. It’s the only enterprise solution to effectively combine supply chain quality and operational excellence into a single, fully configurable operating platform. For more information, please visit www.cmx1.com or call 1-858.997.2140.
Manufacturers "knowingly" sold baby food that contained heavy metals including arsenic, lead, cadmium and mercury, according to a House Oversight subcommittee report, published Wednesday.
The big picture: These metals are in the World Health Organization's top 10 chemicals of concern for infants and children, and can affect brain development, according to Harvard Health Publishing. The companies cited in the report either failed to recall contaminated food or were lax in testing, the report found.
Yes, but: Several baby food manufacturers disagreed with the subcommittee's latest assessment, though they said they're committed to working closely with the FDA to address the issue, according to CNN.
Zoom in: Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi (D-Ill), the chair of the Subcommittee on Economic and Consumer Policy, called for the food industry to work with the FDA on regulations.
Of note: The report found that Gerber and Beech-Nut were among the companies that failed to properly test their products and call contaminated baby food.
What they're saying: Beech-Nut said it had since "decided to stop selling baby products containing rice" because of arsenic worries, adding it was "concerned about being able to consistently obtain rice flour well-below the FDA guidance level," per Politico.
(CNN)Gerber and Beech-Nut failed to properly test and remove baby foods with dangerous levels of inorganic arsenic from the market, while Sprout Foods Inc., Walmart's Parent's Choice and Campbell's Plum Organics baby food were lax in testing and controlling for heavy metals such as lead, mercury and cadmium, according to a US Congressional report released Wednesday by the House Subcommittee on Economic and Consumer Policy.
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Good Neighbor Center helping with food insecurity in Crittenden County wreg.com Article From & Read More ( Good Neighbor Center helping with food insecurity in Crittenden County - wreg.com )
Several leading baby food makers haven’t done enough to screen for neurotoxic heavy metals like arsenic, lead, cadmium in their products, according to a new House Oversight subcommittee report released Wednesday.
The context: The report follows up on an investigation from the same panel earlier this year, which found concerning levels of heavy metal contamination across many popular baby and children’s food products on the market, from rice puffs to infant cereals and purees — findings that enraged parents and put pressure on the FDA to set some standards.
“My subcommittee’s investigation has pulled back the curtain on the baby foods industry, and each revelation has been more damning than the last,” said Rep. Raja Krishnamoorthi (D-Ill.), chair of the Subcommittee on Economic and Consumer Policy.
Brands under fire: The subcommittee’s latest report criticizes Beech-Nut for issuing only a partial recall and Gerber for not doing a recall at all after Alaska state officials earlier this year found that both companies had rice cereals on the market that exceeded FDA’s standard for arsenic. (Beech-Nut has since decided to stop selling rice cereal.)
A spokesperson for Gerber said company officials are reviewing the report. “We have set safety and quality standards that are among the strictest in not just the U.S., but the world,” the spokesperson said. “Because Gerber believes in only the highest standards, we have and will continue to fully cooperate with the congressional subcommittee inquiry.”
The panel also alleges that Plum Organics, another popular brand, sells products “tainted with high levels of toxic metals” based on testing data submitted by the company. Every Plum Super Puffs rice product that was tested from 2017 to 2019 exceeded 200 parts per billion of arsenic, according to the report. Rice puffs are popular snacks for babies and toddlers.
The FDA doesn’t have standards for arsenic in baby food, except for rice cereals, which are supposed to be below 100 ppb, per a standard finalized in 2020. The FDA standard for bottled water is 10 ppb.
Walmart, which sells its own private-label products, was heavily criticized in the report for weakening its own internal standard for inorganic arsenic, which for a time was more stringent than FDA’s. The company’s limit was 23 ppb until 2018.
Relaxing the company’s own standard was an “extreme course reversal on efforts to protect babies’ neurological development,” the panel said.
Sprout Foods, another major brand, was blasted for only requiring that its ingredients be tested for heavy metals once per year, a policy the subcommittee called “the most reckless testing practice among manufacturers on the market.”
Beech-Nut, Plum, Walmart and Sprout didn’t immediately respond to requests for comments Wednesday. The subcommittee said all five companies were cooperating with the panel’s inquiries to varying degrees, submitting data and other information to staff.
What the panel wants: The subcommittee is urging the FDA to speed up its work to set its first-ever standards for heavy metals across most baby food products over the next three years, a plan the agency unveiled in April after facing a barrage of criticism for acting slowly on the issue.
FDA quietly began looking into heavy metals in 2017 after an EPA study found that food was a surprisingly significant source of lead exposure for young children, as POLITICO previously reported.
The subcommittee is now pressing the FDA to go ahead and require baby food makers to test their finished products for heavy metals now instead of waiting for standards to be finalized.
The panel is also urging the industry to phase out any products that frequently test high in heavy metals, such as rice, which routinely contains higher levels of arsenic due to environmental contamination from pesticides used decades ago.
A food system problem: Concerning levels of lead, arsenic, mercury and cadmium can routinely be found in many foods, including rice, sweet potatoes, carrots, juices and spices. Crops can uptake the toxins from soils. Heavy metals are both naturally occurring and the result of widespread environmental pollution.
It’s a problem facing the food supply more broadly — not just in baby products — which means that parents cannot avoid heavy metals by making their own meals. Some experts think certain types of food processing could be making the metals more concentrated. There are also concerns that some vitamins and other additives used in products can be contaminated.
There's a particular concern about foods served to babies and toddlers because they are more developmentally vulnerable. Even exceedingly small amounts of these neurotoxins can impede a child’s IQ, hinder brain development, lead to behavioral problems, increase cancer risk and raise the chances of many other diseases. Safe thresholds have not been set for most foods.
Looming legislation: Democrats on Capitol Hill are still backing legislation that would force the FDA to set strict limits for all four metals within a year.
The bill, which enjoys support from House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, mandates what those limits should be: 10 parts per billion for inorganic arsenic in baby food (15 ppb for cereal); 5 ppb for both cadmium and lead (10 ppb for cereal); and 2 ppb for mercury. The legislation has 21 co-sponsors in the House and five in the Senate.
Sep 29, 2021
Around the world, roughly one-third of food produced for human consumption is lost or wasted from farm to table, amounting to around 1.3 billion tonnes per year. Covid-19 has exposed vulnerabilities in our food systems and heightened the need to remedy food loss and waste (FLW), both locally and globally.
Reducing food loss and waste is a powerful means to strengthen the sustainability of our food systems and improve planetary health. How does food waste affect the environment? A great deal, it turns out. In the United States, more than 35 million tons of food went into landfills in 2018. Food waste in landfills generates methane, a potent greenhouse gas that contributes to climate change. Keeping food waste out of landfills is one way to help the environment.
September 29 is the International Day of Awareness of Food Loss and Waste, an opportunity to raise awareness of practices and innovations to reduce food loss and waste and build a more resilient food system. The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) delivered six key messages highlighting areas to catalyze change towards reduced food loss and waste. Here are some of those messages:
Ultimately, turning these messages into policies and practices locally and globally is the only way to ensure that we build a sustainable and resilient food system that has no room for food waste.
Read more blogs on the topic of food loss and waste.
Food safety was not a major focus of the UN Food Systems Summit but has been included in a newly formed coalition.
The food system coalitions cut across five priority areas for action. Food safety will be part of the Coalition for Healthy Diets from Sustainable Food Systems.
“We must use the power of ingenuity to improve on food systems so they provide safe, nutritious, affordable and accessible food for all, while conserving natural resources and combating the climate crisis,” said Tom Vilsack, U.S. agriculture secretary.
The World Health Organization (WHO) will support this work with UNICEF, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), UNEP and the World Food Programme.
“Healthy diets and sustainably produced, safe food for all is not an out of reach aspiration, but an unavoidable component of global development, a human right and an achievable goal which can be realized through clear, well established and aligned actions,” said Francesco Branca, WHO director of nutrition and food safety.
A six-month follow-up after the summit is planned where the coalition’s governance, processes, membership, commitments and work plan undergoes further refinement informed by bimonthly meetings with interested parties.
It had been hoped food safety would get its own coalition as action track 1 was “ensure access to safe and nutritious food for all.”
Keeping the momentum
A number of commitments have been made as part of the five action areas. These include one from OBOR Legal Research Centre on ensuring, promoting and improving food safety in Asia.
Another is from the Global Alliance for Improved Nutrition (GAIN) that helped form a partnership to ensure the safety of foods is not forgotten. The Safe Food Partnership brought together 100 members from industry, government, academia, and the public.
Those interested in the group include the European Commission, Codex, African Union, International Dairy Federation, Tetra Pak, DNV, ILRI, United Fresh and the Produce Marketing Association, GFSI, PepsiCo, Unilever, Danone and Nestlé.
Members said the focus of food safety investment for export must shift to domestic consumption and public health. Governments need better data on the public health and economic impacts of foodborne disease. Consumers must be given knowledge and choices to help drive markets to provide safe food.
GAIN is also hosting a webinar following the summit on food safety transformation in Africa, Asia, and Latin America.
Regional leaders plan to share their insights and the realities on the ground considering politics, financing, scalability, inclusivity, and gaps in capacity and infrastructure.
The discussion, on Sept. 30, will be moderated by Steve Wearne and panelists will share challenges, lessons learned, successes, and their vision for the future of food safety.
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Article From & Read More ( Food safety finds a place in outcomes of UN summit - Food Safety News )With permission, we repost Doug Farquhar’s most recent summary of food and food safety legislative actions by states.
By Doug Farquhar, JD
State legislatures introduced several hundred bills related to food during their 2021 legislative sessions. Almost every state introduced legislation regarding food. From food delivery, cannabis, and coronavirus to food freedom, state legislatures heard about proposed policy changes to food laws.
NEHA tracked 382 bills in 36 states, with 73 being enacted in 36 states. Most legislatures have adjourned (aka sine die) for 2021.
NEHA identified 73 bills enacted by state legislatures in the 2021 legislative session regarding food safety, including bills related to retail food, food delivery, restaurants, raw milk, and food freedom laws.
Cannabis in Foods
Kentucky HB 325 establishes labeling requirements for cannabidiol products.
Nevada enacted SB 114 (2021) that relates to hemp and authorizes the sale or production of food that contains hemp at food establishments. The law requires the Department of Health and Human Services to adopt regulations related to food that contains hemp and prohibits food from being deemed as adulterated solely because such food contains hemp.
In Virginia, HB 1430 and SB 918 (2021) create the Industrial Hemp Fund that declares industrial hemp extract as a food, subjects it to statutory requirements, and establishes standards for the manufacturing of industrial hemp extract. Industrial hemp is approved as a food additive.
Raw Milk/Dairy
Alaska enacted HB 22 that relates to raw milk and a shared animal program.
Pennsylvania’s SB 434 provides for milk sell-by and best-by date labeling.
Vermont enacted HB 218 (Act 22) that relates to the sale of unpasteurized raw milk.
Food Freedom/Cottage Foods
In the 2021 state legislative sessions, 69 bills in 29 states were related to cottage foods that relaxed or eliminated food safety requirements for retail foods. In total, 15 of these bills have been enacted into law.
Alabama expanded its cottage foods law, allowing for online sales, removing the gross receipts cap, and requiring nutrition labeling (SB 160).
Arkansas also expanded its cottage food law to include internet sales (HB 1118). The state enacted the Food Freedom Act that exempts producers of homemade food and drinks from licensure, certification, and inspection (SB 248).
California’s AB 831 would require a cottage food operation that advertises to indicate that the food is made or packaged in a home kitchen.
The Colorado legislature enacted SB 21-079 to deregulate meat sales. The act allows the sale of meat (rabbit, cattle, elk, sheep, hogs, bison, and goats, but not fish) of a shared animal without licensure, regulation, or inspection by a public health agency.
Florida expanded its cottage food operation by increasing the annual gross sales, offering the sale of cottage foods through the mail, and preempting the regulation of cottage food operations by prohibiting local governments from regulating cottage foods operations (HB 663).
SB 2007 (Public Act 0633) in Illinois requires that cottage food operations comply with certain food safety requirements. The law requires local health departments to register cottage food operations and allows them to sample water used for such operations. The law requires each cottage food product that is shipped to be sealed in a manner that reveals tampering and prohibits a cottage food product from being shipped out of state. It also exempts from state regulation the sale of non-potentially hazardous baked goods by a religious, charitable, or nonprofit organization for fundraising purposes. The bill contains a home rule preemption.
The Indiana legislature requested recommendations regarding home-based vendors from state agencies (SB 185, P.L. 140).
Montana enacted the Local Food Choice Act exempting homemade food producers from state licensure, permitting, certification, and labeling requirements (SB 199, Chap. 04 30).
The New Mexico legislature enacted the Homemade Food Act (HB 177, Chap. 98) that establishes labeling requirements and exempts nonhazardous homemade food items from regulation, as well as preempts local oversight of homemade foods.
Oklahoma enacted HB 1032 that exempts the production and sale of homemade food products from licensing and other requirements of the State Department of Health and the Department of Agriculture, Food, and Forestry. Homemade food products shall not include alcoholic beverages, unpasteurized milk, or cannabis or marijuana products.
In Utah, the legislature enacted HB 94 that allows for microenterprise home kitchens.
Wyoming expanded its food freedom law by authorizing the sale of eggs and homemade foods in accordance with federal exemptions (HB 1118, Chap. 42).
Food Delivery
A total of five states enacted laws on food delivery.
Arkansas enacted the Fair Food Delivery Act (HB 1426). Food delivery must have an agreement with a food facility to take food orders and deliver food orders prepared by the food facility to customers.
Colorado’s SB 21-035 prohibits a third-party delivery service from arranging a pickup from a retail food establishment without their consent.
New Hampshire enacted HB 593 (Chap. 144) that requires food service delivery to enter into an agreement with the food establishment or retail store before offering delivery service from that establishment.
The New Jersey legislature enacted S 2437 (P.L. C 42) that limits service fees charged to restaurants by third-party takeout and delivery operations during COVID-19.
Texas SB 911 relates to the regulation of restaurants and third-party food delivery services, including the issuance of alcoholic beverage certificates to restaurants.
Food Deserts
Overall, four bills were enacted on food deserts.
Maryland addressed food deserts (HB 831 and SB 723) through the establishment of the Food Safety System Resiliency Council to address the food insecurity crisis due to the pandemic, develop recommendations to increase the long-term resiliency of the food system, and develop a plan to increase the production and procurement of state-certified food by Nov. 1, 2021, (HB 831 and SB 723, Sess. 2021).
Maine enacted LD 691 to support farms and address food insecurity.
In Utah, SB 141 calls for a task force on food security.
The New York legislature is directing the Commissioner of Agriculture and Markets to produce a report on the state’s farm and food supply regarding ways to improve the resiliency of food supply chain logistics to address food shortages, food wastes, and the inability to get estate-grown food goods to markets as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic (AB 952 and SB 1305, Sess. 2021).
Food Donation and Supply
New York A 963, S 901 (Chap. 63) relates to supermarkets providing excess food to food relief organizations.
New York A 1262, SB 878 (Chap. 15) relates to the state working with the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) to receive approvals and develop online fresh food purchasing options throughout the state.
Texas HB 1276 would increase access to bulk food by allowing foodservice establishments to sell certain consumer food products directly to an individual.
West Virginia amended its state farm bill (HB 2633, Chap. 7).
Meat Products
Bills in nine states were enacted regarding meat products.
Arkansas HB 1315 transfers the state’s meat inspection program to the department of agriculture.
Maine’s LD 66 makes technical changes to the laws governing the preparation of livestock and poultry products for human consumption. The law prohibits the sale of horsemeat and limits the sale of meat to “cattle, sheep, swine, goats, or an exotic species defined by the federal act, not deer, rabbits, or equines” (HB 66, Sess. 2021). LD 77 authorizes the Maine Department of Marine Resources to charge an application fee for entering a lottery for a scallop license (HB 77, Sess. 2021).
Montana joined the Interstate Cooperative Meatpacking Compact (HB 336, Chap. 05 07).
Nebraska amended its Meat and Poultry Inspection Law. LB 324 would allow the acquisition of meat through an animal share contract — an ownership interest in an animal or herd of animals created by a written contract between a consumer and a farmer or rancher. The meat sold must be inspected by USDA; however, the law would allow a producer to sell packages of meat to consumers under a custom exemption in federal law.
Virginia’s HB 1353 (Chap. 0318) updates existing code regarding the Federal Meat Inspection Act and the Federal Poultry Products Inspection Act. Virginia also enacted HB 1448, SB 791 (Chap. 0201) regarding the management of the menhaden fishery to comply with the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Commission Interstate Fishery Management Plan for Atlantic Menhaden.
Wyoming’s HB 51 (Chap. 155) authorizes a state government program to expand and enhance meat processing capabilities. HB 54 (Chap. 44) amends the duties of the Wyoming business council to require support for producers in the agriculture and meat processing industry, expands permissible loans and grants to Wyoming meat producers and processors, and limits state rulemaking authority related to meat processing.
Micro Markets
Indiana enacted SB 20 regarding micro-market food sales. The law specifies that a “vending machine” includes a self-service device that can be activated by the use of a software application on a smartphone. The law also provides that an owner or operator of a micro-market must notify the corporation or local health department where the micro-market is located no later than 10 business days after the installation of the market.
Retail Foods
California enacted AB 831, amending its retail food code by expanding the foodservice functions of a charitable feeding operation to include commercially prepared hazardous cold or frozen foods. It also would authorize satellite food services to operate within a permanent food facility and makes pushcarts exempt from mechanical exhaust ventilation equipment requirements.
Oklahoma’s HB 1772 requires the State Board of Health to provide a multi-seasonal license for snow cone stands that sell hot beverages in addition to snow cones.
Texas S.B. 617 defines a “producer,” as a person who added value to the food product the person is selling and clarifies that farmers’ markets must have a majority of their vendors who are farmers or food producers selling food directly to consumers. The bill would recompense farmers’ market vendors for their expense in bringing suit to enforce the law if necessary.
Supplement Nutrition and Assistance Program (SNAP)
Laws about SNAP were enacted in five states.
Connecticut’s HB 6385 includes chicken eggs as part of the state’s Farmers Market/WIC and Senior Nutrition Program. Hawaii’s SB 512 (Act 177) removes the $10/day cap on the state’s healthy food incentive program. The law also allows health proteins for purchase under the program.
The Maryland legislature enacted SB 913 that establishes the Heat and Eat Program within SNAP, expanding food access and studying whether SNAP recipients can be automatically eligible for the state’s Energy Assistance Program.
New Jersey’s A 4240 (P.L. C 93) provides a technological upgrade to the SNAP application process. The state’s AB 5405 (P.L. C 67) appropriates $10 million to support food bank organizations.
Tennessee’s SB 751 (Chap. 515) establishes fines for certain offenses related to fraudulently obtaining food assistance.
Water Bottle Filling Stations
Louisiana HB 132 requires newly constructed public school buildings to be equipped with water bottle filling stations.
Editors Note: Doug Farquhar is the director of Government Affairs at the National Environmental Health Association in Denver. Farquhar previously was the long-time director of the Environmental Health Program at the National
Conference of State Legislatures. At NCSL, Farquhar helped develop tools that improved the non-partisan policy shop’s ability to track state legislative actions in real-time. He was generous in sharing that work with Food Safety News when he was at NCLS and we are pleased to report he continues to be helpful to us at NEHA.
Article From & Read More ( 2021's enacted state legislation regarding food and food safety - Food Safety News )
According to feedingamerica.com., Michigan had the sixth-highest rate of projected food insecurity in 2020. Pregnant women are one of the largest victims of this.
This leads kids not only to grow up in food-insecure households but face health issues from birth due to hunger and low nutritional intake both during and after pregnancy.
These statistics are no longer just numbers with no action, due to several figures in the Lansing community seeking to mitigate food insecurity.
President of Sparrow Hospital Alan Vierling, Nursing Director at Sparrow Hospital Toniye Andrews-Johnson and MSU College of Nursing lead Jiying Ling pioneered a program to provide for food-insecure families in their time of need.
The new program at Sparrow Hospital started as they noticed the struggle in their pregnant patients and the effects food insecurity had on their fetuses. The hospital took on the mission of improving the health of people in mid-Michigan by piloting a project to identify and assist food-insecure new moms and their families.
The program is not a “one time thing” and provides access to pantries and food banks, Johnson said. The program requires patients to complete an online survey two times and participate in a healthy eating program.
Participants will then receive a crockpot, a cookbook, groceries and a healthy eating/motivational text message three times a week. Participants will also learn healthy eating tips.
The collaboration of these two teams occurred due to Ling’s involvement in similar past projects, such as her work with the head-start program and her cookbook, “The Tasty Healthy Cookbook,” which she created to include healthier and quicker options for students on campus.
In 2016, Ling said she received pressure to include more recipes in the cookbook due to its successful impact on the lives of many students and their families.
Vierling and Johnson had heard about the cookbook and asked Ling if it were a good idea to adapt this to target the pregnant woman with food insecurity.
“Now, pregnant women have the same issue,” Ling said. “They don't have much time to cook, and the females also have food insecurity, which means they may have some financial problems, too. So, we tried to kind of expand the cookbook to pregnant women's security.”
While Vierling and Johnson initiated the project at Sparrow, MSU students and Ling’s project manager Kristen Bilyea put time and effort into developing the evidence-based, fun, healthy and low-cost recipes. Finally, the Michigan Endowment Fund and the National Institute of Health financially supported the development of “The Tasty Healthy Cookbook.”
Both Johnson and Ling were inspired by their own experiences and jobs.
“Personally, I have two young children, too,” Ling said. “Majority was single mom, you know, with the young children. So, they really also don’t have much time to prepare a healthy meal for the family. That's kind of known from my own experience, and the observation of working with these families.”
If interested or want to recommend this program, you can contact bilyearkr@msu.edu or text/call 517-914-7692 with any questions.
Though this is just the beginning of the program, the future for it aims to be great, Johnson said.
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