Alarm Over Food Safety Bill

Frantic emails and headlines have been flying around the past few days, extolling the dangers of the HR 875 bill submitted to the House for consideration. It will outlaw organic farming! It will make storing heirloom seeds illegal! As it turns out, neither of these assertions is true. The Food Safety Modernization Act of 2009, intended to prevent future large-scale food safety problems, does not even explicitly mention organic farming. Several organizations, including Slow Food USA and Food and Water Watch, recommend that people remain calm. They simply take issue with the fact that the bill caters to large-scale suppliers, and urge concerned foodies to tell their Congress members that the welfare of smaller organic and sustainable businesses matters when creating new legislation. So the verdict, at least for the time being, is: don’t panic, you can still go organic.