Fwd: Almond Pasteurization Report from the USDA/Cornucopia Meeting

[Guest guest]

Here is the latest information on the almond issue from The Cornucopia

Institute. If you haven't already, please do as they request and send

in a proxy letter or one of your own and ask others to do the same.

Thanks,

Jeff

 

Hello all –

I want to provide a brief update on our visit to Washington, D.C. and

our meeting with three high-ranking officials at the USDA to discuss

the almond pasteurization matter.

Cornucopia's Codirector, Mark Kastel, and myself met for more than an

hour with the three officials in the office of USDA Undersecretary

Bruce Knight. The bulk of our discussion centered on almonds.

Interestingly, we learned that half of all the comments coming into

the Secretary's office at this time are on almonds! People across the

country are upset with the pasteurization plan and want the ability to

again buy raw, untreated domestically grown almonds. We want to thank

and congratulate all our collaborators on helping elicit such a strong

response.

As you know, people have been mailing us individually signed proxy

letters for us to hand-deliver to Washington. We used this meeting as

an opportunity to hand over a stack of well over 1500 letters. It was

an impressive moment, and we were told that now all these new contacts

will have to be logged in with the thousands of previous public

comments received on this issue (more letters continue coming into our

offices which we will deliver again to the USDA in the near future—

please encourage anyone who has not submitted a proxy yet to download

one from the Cornucopia website).

We were asked why there was such a public outcry on this rule with the

officials expressing their surprise and amazement at the level of

public concern. We explained the diverse desires of consumers, the

demands of product manufacturers, and the mounting negative impact of

the rule on family farmers and organic farmers who are losing markets

and income from the pasteurization plan.

We then offered a compromise proposal for USDA to consider, one that

we believe can help resolve this situation. We suggested that USDA

support a plan allowing for the sale of untreated American grown

almonds with a warning label. The warning label serves two purposes:

it allows for continued freedom of choice in the marketplace and it

allows marketers the option of continuing to " pasture as " raw almonds.

Having a warning label is by no means our first choice but might be

the only politically expedient option at this point in time and a

number of growers and handlers that we have spoken to have supported

this compromise position.

The warning label approach is something that is already done for other

foods sold in the U.S., such as some fresh, unpasteurized fruit

juices. We know that FDA would have to be involved with such a

labeling action, but we fully believe that if USDA throws its weight

behind the proposal (along with the thousands of consumers and

commercial interests who would support this) that such an approach

would likely gain approval at the FDA.

USDA officials also questioned us on a second and companion solution –

a pasteurization exemption for organic almond growers. The organic

sector has not been implicated in any of the past contamination

problems associated with almonds . Organic growers have their own set

of mandatory protocols and best management practices that are employed

in their orchards which substantially lower the salmonella

contamination risk. An exemption for these growers would greatly

diminish the harm that is being caused to these farmers who are losing

marketshare to imports. This might be a good fallback compromise

position although we are afraid that it will leave many growers and

consumers of conventional almonds disadvantaged.

Our proposed solution to the situation was not rejected, but was met

with some expression of support. In fact, one of the participants

described our meeting as " rather constructive. " We were asked to send

the officials a formal letter outlining the specific remedy to the

problem, which we have since done.

Clearly for this proposal to gather more support from USDA, it will

have to be further discussed and approved of by others at Agency

(((you can't get much higher up than the folks we were talking to and

the meeting was sanctioned by Knight))). I will say that I am

encouraged by what we heard and how the offer was received.

We are going to ask those of you who have been working with us on this

issue to give the process a little more time to play out, perhaps into

mid-January before we move onto other steps, primarily legal. We made

certain that the officials in this meeting knew that we are prepared

to go to court and challenge the almond pasteurization rule over its

many and unexpected adverse impacts should this compromise proposal be

rejected. We tried to impress upon them that time was of the essence

in crafting a compromise before going to court.

But that doesn't mean we are going to sit around waiting for their

decision. We have had lengthy additional talks with attorneys about a

possible legal challenge, are continuing to network with other

organizations around the country, we are gathering more information

from farmers hurt by the rule and from retailers and product

manufacturers who are shifting to untreated raw foreign almonds to

meet consumer demand. We will also be talking with more members of

Congress about this. Most of all, we want to keep the heat turned-up

on the USDA and we are encouraging all of you to help with that.

Please continue sharing with us any information, thoughts, and/or

questions that you think would be useful in this campaign. I look

forward to hearing from you.

Sincerely,

 

Will Fantle

 

PS: Because the negotiations with the USDA are at a critical moment we

would encourage you to reach out to your members, customers and

network of friends and family asking them to download one of the proxy

letters from the Cornucopia website and mail it back to us—if they

have not already done so. I would like to see a steady stream of these

letters delivered to the USDA every week or two until we are finished

with the negotiations. Together, let's keep the pressure on.

 

To download proxy letters go to www.cornucopia.org and go to the

Authentic Almond Project link on the left hand navigation column.

 

 

--

Eli Penberthy

Food and Farms Policy Analyst

The Cornucopia Institute

www.cornucopia.org

 

 

[Guest guest]

Here is the latest information on the almond issue from The Cornucopia

Institute. If you haven't already, please do as they request and send

in a proxy letter or one of your own and ask others to do the same.

Thanks,

Jeff

 

Hello all –

I want to provide a brief update on our visit to Washington, D.C. and

our meeting with three high-ranking officials at the USDA to discuss

the almond pasteurization matter.

Cornucopia's Codirector, Mark Kastel, and myself met for more than an

hour with the three officials in the office of USDA Undersecretary

Bruce Knight. The bulk of our discussion centered on almonds.

Interestingly, we learned that half of all the comments coming into

the Secretary's office at this time are on almonds! People across the

country are upset with the pasteurization plan and want the ability to

again buy raw, untreated domestically grown almonds. We want to thank

and congratulate all our collaborators on helping elicit such a strong

response.

As you know, people have been mailing us individually signed proxy

letters for us to hand-deliver to Washington. We used this meeting as

an opportunity to hand over a stack of well over 1500 letters. It was

an impressive moment, and we were told that now all these new contacts

will have to be logged in with the thousands of previous public

comments received on this issue (more letters continue coming into our

offices which we will deliver again to the USDA in the near future—

please encourage anyone who has not submitted a proxy yet to download

one from the Cornucopia website).

We were asked why there was such a public outcry on this rule with the

officials expressing their surprise and amazement at the level of

public concern. We explained the diverse desires of consumers, the

demands of product manufacturers, and the mounting negative impact of

the rule on family farmers and organic farmers who are losing markets

and income from the pasteurization plan.

We then offered a compromise proposal for USDA to consider, one that

we believe can help resolve this situation. We suggested that USDA

support a plan allowing for the sale of untreated American grown

almonds with a warning label. The warning label serves two purposes:

it allows for continued freedom of choice in the marketplace and it

allows marketers the option of continuing to " pasture as " raw almonds.

Having a warning label is by no means our first choice but might be

the only politically expedient option at this point in time and a

number of growers and handlers that we have spoken to have supported

this compromise position.

The warning label approach is something that is already done for other

foods sold in the U.S., such as some fresh, unpasteurized fruit

juices. We know that FDA would have to be involved with such a

labeling action, but we fully believe that if USDA throws its weight

behind the proposal (along with the thousands of consumers and

commercial interests who would support this) that such an approach

would likely gain approval at the FDA.

USDA officials also questioned us on a second and companion solution –

a pasteurization exemption for organic almond growers. The organic

sector has not been implicated in any of the past contamination

problems associated with almonds . Organic growers have their own set

of mandatory protocols and best management practices that are employed

in their orchards which substantially lower the salmonella

contamination risk. An exemption for these growers would greatly

diminish the harm that is being caused to these farmers who are losing

marketshare to imports. This might be a good fallback compromise

position although we are afraid that it will leave many growers and

consumers of conventional almonds disadvantaged.

Our proposed solution to the situation was not rejected, but was met

with some expression of support. In fact, one of the participants

described our meeting as " rather constructive. " We were asked to send

the officials a formal letter outlining the specific remedy to the

problem, which we have since done.

Clearly for this proposal to gather more support from USDA, it will

have to be further discussed and approved of by others at Agency

(((you can't get much higher up than the folks we were talking to and

the meeting was sanctioned by Knight))). I will say that I am

encouraged by what we heard and how the offer was received.

We are going to ask those of you who have been working with us on this

issue to give the process a little more time to play out, perhaps into

mid-January before we move onto other steps, primarily legal. We made

certain that the officials in this meeting knew that we are prepared

to go to court and challenge the almond pasteurization rule over its

many and unexpected adverse impacts should this compromise proposal be

rejected. We tried to impress upon them that time was of the essence

in crafting a compromise before going to court.

But that doesn't mean we are going to sit around waiting for their

decision. We have had lengthy additional talks with attorneys about a

possible legal challenge, are continuing to network with other

organizations around the country, we are gathering more information

from farmers hurt by the rule and from retailers and product

manufacturers who are shifting to untreated raw foreign almonds to

meet consumer demand. We will also be talking with more members of

Congress about this. Most of all, we want to keep the heat turned-up

on the USDA and we are encouraging all of you to help with that.

Please continue sharing with us any information, thoughts, and/or

questions that you think would be useful in this campaign. I look

forward to hearing from you.

Sincerely,

 

Will Fantle

 

PS: Because the negotiations with the USDA are at a critical moment we

would encourage you to reach out to your members, customers and

network of friends and family asking them to download one of the proxy

letters from the Cornucopia website and mail it back to us—if they

have not already done so. I would like to see a steady stream of these

letters delivered to the USDA every week or two until we are finished

with the negotiations. Together, let's keep the pressure on.

 

To download proxy letters go to www.cornucopia.org and go to the

Authentic Almond Project link on the left hand navigation column.

 

 

--

Eli Penberthy

Food and Farms Policy Analyst

The Cornucopia Institute

www.cornucopia.org