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sonny perdue
Lawsuit Aims to Halt Trump-Approved GMO Labels Critics Denounce as Nothing But a 'Scam'
"Instead of providing meaningful labeling," warns the Center for Food Safety, new USDA rules "will only create more uncertainty for consumers, retailers, and manufacturers."
Dec 29, 2021
Amid an ongoing lawsuit challenging what critics call deceptive Trump-era U.S. Department of Agriculture regulations for labeling genetically engineered foods, a leading advocacy group on Wednesday announced the launch of a consumer action campaign ahead of the new rules taking effect on January 1.
"These regulations are not about informing the public but rather designed to allow corporations to hide their use of genetically engineered ingredients from their customers."
"Consumers have fought for decades for their right to know what's in their food and how it's produced," Meredith Stevenson, an attorney for the Center for Food Safety (CFS), said in a statement. "But instead of providing meaningful labeling, USDA's final rules will only create more uncertainty for consumers, retailers, and manufacturers."
CFS is set to launch a nationwide consumer campaign using "citizen investigators" to identify corporations using QR codes instead of on-package text or symbol labeling to conceal their use of GMOs. Those companies will then be pressured to adopt on-package text or symbol labeling in addition to QR codes.
The use of QR codes has been called discriminatory against millions of poor, elderly, and rural people who don't own smartphones, or who live in areas where grocery stores lack internet connections.
In December 2018, the USDA released the new labeling rules two years after the Republican-controlled Congress passed the National Bioengineered Food Disclosure Law. Sonny Perdue, Trump's industry-friendly agriculture secretary, claimed the new standards for genetically engineerd (GE or GMO) foods would increase "the transparency of our nation's food system" and provide "clear information and labeling consistency for consumers."
Critics, however, said the regulations are an insidious attempt to conceal Big Ag's increasing use of genetically engineered ingredients in food products, and that the new rules leave most GMO-derived foods unlabeled.
"These regulations are not about informing the public but rather designed to allow corporations to hide their use of genetically engineered ingredients from their customers," Andrew Kimbrell, CFS executive director said in a statement.
"It is a regulatory scam which we are seeking to rescind in federal court," he added. "In addition, we are urging our million CFS members and others to become citizen investigators and find and expose the companies that are using QR codes instead of on-package text or symbol labeling, thereby trying to keep us in the dark about what they have put in our food."
In July 2020, CFS filed a lawsuit in a San Francisco federal court on behalf of a coalition of advocacy groups and retailers--including Natural Grocers, which has 157 stores in 20 states, and Puget Consumers Co-op, the largest U.S. community-owned food market--challenging the USDA rules.
"A disclosure law that exempts 70% of the foods it is supposed to disclose is not a meaningful disclosure law," Tara Cook Littman of Citizens for GMO Labeling, a plaintiff in the case, said at the time of its filing. The new rules are a "fraud," she said, that allow "producers to keep their GMO ingredients secret."
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Agriculture Secretary Perdue Failed to Disclose Conflicts of Interest
New research by nonpartisan government watchdog Accountable.US
Oct 15, 2020
New research by nonpartisan government watchdog Accountable.US reported today in Politico shows Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue has failed to disclose conflicts of interest.
Even though Perdue pledged during his confirmation process in 2017 to put his assets in a blind trust so that he would not benefit from decisions he makes as secretary, he appears not to have followed through on that agreement. Perdue received nearly $140,000 in income after seeking to increase the value of conservation mitigation bank credits.
"Throughout his political career Secretary Perdue has routinely put his own financial interests above the best interests of the American people. Unfortunately, this type of self-dealing is nothing new in the Trump administration -- but that doesn't make it any less wrong or potentially illegal," said Chris Saeger, a spokesperson for Accountable.US. "Decisions made by the U.S. Department of Agriculture should serve the American people, not narrow interests who have special access to the top decision maker -- and certainly not the secretary himself. The inspector general should immediately initiate a review of Secretary Perdue's actions of these serious conflicts of interest that raise questions about the integrity of his decision-making over the last four years."
Download the research at this link.
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Derision, Disbelief After Iowa Meatpacking Plant Where Hundreds Caught Coronavirus Fined Just $957
The fine levied against Iowa Premium Beef—for a minor record-keeping violation—was cut in half by a state official.
Sep 24, 2020
Iowa regulators on Thursday levied their first coronavirus-related fine against a meatpacking plant--a $957 citation for a minor record-keeping violation by a subsidiary of one of the nation's biggest beef processing companies.
The Associated Pressreports the Iowa Occupational Safety and Health Administration issued the citation to the Iowa Premium Beef Plant in Tama, where 338 of the facility's 850 employees tested positive for Covid-19 during an April outbreak that produced one of the state's first "hot spots." That's 80 more workers than the state previously acknowledged, according to inspection records.
\u201cIowa regulators have issued their first citation to a meatpacking plant with a large #coronavirus outbreak that sickened its workforce \u2014 a $957 fine for a minor record-keeping violation. https://t.co/xNrLgQe8oo\u201d— Star Tribune Business (@Star Tribune Business) 1600977175
Iowa OSHA announced on June 1 that it would investigate the Tama plant and four other meat processing facilities in the state where thousands of workers had tested positive for coronavirus. Records reviewed by the AP showed that none of the other plants were fined, despite at least nine Covid-19 deaths among them.
The other facilities that were investigated by the agency are Tyson Foods plants in Waterloo, Columbus Junction, and Perry, and the JBS plant in Marshalltown.
Iowa OSHA cited two "other-than-serious" violations committed by the Tama plant: failure to keep a required log of workplace-related injuries and illnesses, and failure to provide the document within four hours after inspectors requested it.
The fine was originally meant to be twice as high. However, Iowa OSHA Administrator Russell Perry approved a settlement with the company cutting the amount in half. Iowa Premium Beef--which last year was purchased by National Beef, the nation's fourth-largest beef processor--also agreed to correct the violations.
Observers reacted to the fine with disbelief and derision:
\u201cWow. 338 workers got sick in this outbreak, and Iowa Premium Beef negotiated down their Iowa OSHA fine from $1,914 to $957.\u201d— Leah Douglas (@Leah Douglas) 1600973645
\u201c40% of their employees test positive for COVID and you only fine the company $957??? Jfc. \n\n https://t.co/KPoA87h28k\u201d— Justin Kittle (@Justin Kittle) 1600982070
\u201cAn underappreciated narrative from this pandemic will be how far state and federal officials go to hold corporations accountable for their actions\n\nImportant to note this was reduced from a $1,914 fine to $957\u201d— jael holzman (@jael holzman) 1600980298
The first Iowa fine comes less than two weeks after the U.S. Labor Department fined JBS Foods, the U.S. subsidiary of Brazilian giant JBS SA--which, with over $50 billion in annual sales, is the world's largest meat processing company--a paltry $15,615 for failing to adequately protect workers against coronavirus.
Beatriz Rangel, daughter of Saul Sanchez--the first JBS Foods employee to die of Covid-19--called the small fine "a slap in the face."
News of the Tama fine also follows the revelation earlier this month that the U.S. Department of Agriculture and the meatpacking industry collaborated to downplay and disregard risks to worker health during the Covid-19 pandemic.
Secretary of Agriculture Sonny Perdue--an agribusiness tycoon and former Georgia governor with a long history of corruption--has been criticized for pushing meat processing facilities to remain open or quickly reopen during the coronavirus pandemic. The meatpacking industry in Iowa has been described as "too big too fail," wielding tremendous political power in the heavily agricultural Midwestern state.
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