...the whole world in her loaf Posted by Reggie at 08/19/07 10:31 AM

She’s got guar gum sourced from India
In her loaf
She’s got gluten mix from Poland
In her loaf
She’s left no country untapped for honey
In her loaf
Sara Lee's got the whole world in her loaf

The inspiration for this parody came from an article in the San Jose Mercury News. Consumers Union’s Elisa Odabashian summed it up nicely in her quote, “It’s not just the stuff that says “made in China.” It’s the stuff in the stuff that says “Made in the U.S.A.”

Odabashian went on to say, “We’re importing more and more of our food and we’re inspecting almost none of it.”

comments (2)

1 Posted by Ariana Coate at 08/30/07 07:26 PM

There is a false assumption that food inspection will make food safe. Certainly, imported food should be inspected, especially when it comes from a country with no or low regulations about food safety.

But many of the regulations that are being put into place in this country are detrimental to small farmers and especially to organic farmers. Many of these regulations are so restrictive or expensive that small farmers are shut out.

This means that only large factory farms can compete and it is precisely in these farms and the processing plants that harmful diseases are spread. What might be a small outbreak of an illness becomes a huge one when the meat from one infected cow is mixed with thousands of others in a large processing factory.

The regulations that are being put into place include things like the National Animal Identification System which is so comprehensive that it would affect every person who has a cow or two or a few chickens or sheep. It is so probitive that many small farmers would be adversely affected. They also include regulations that make it impossible to use manure as part of soil building in vegetable production. Many organic farms count on manure, and the manure they use is safe because organic standards already require that it be well composted which kills any pathogenic bacteria that might be in it.

What would truly increase food safety would be to go to a more local sourcing of food. Then the consumers would have a better ability to ensure that their food is safe themselves. They would be able to talk with the farmers and visit the farms. If big factory farms had consumers visiting them and the slaughter houses they use to see how their animals or vegetables were raised and/or slaughtered, those farms would become a lot more responsible because people would not want to eat food that is raised the way that much of it is now.

2 Posted by Jerome Karshna at 09/25/07 04:47 PM

It would be almost impossible to inspect all food coming in to this country, but I would certainly like to know the origin of all foods. It should be listed on the label. When I have this information I can make my own decisions. As an example, I avoid any canned goods from most Far East countries whenever I can find the same item processed here. Of course if one wants to be really safe, one would have to grow one's own food and raise one's own animals. And eating out one doesn't usually know where the food comes from. Life is fraught with hazards, but it's hard to overstate the benefits of information.