What I'd like to see added to this over time are more protections for children - an expanded fresh fruit & vegetable program, better funding for school lunch programs (particularly farm to school programs and school gardens), less junk in schools, and limits on marketing to children by junk food companies. At any rate - take a look, comment, and if you'd like to get involved in these issues in the future, check out La Vida Locavore (a progressive food blog) and Recipe For America (a site devoted to a liberal food & ag policy platform).
We believe that the government should support a food supply that is sustainable both environmentally and economically. We believe that the level of control exerted by large multinational corporations over agriculture and our food supply is inconsistent with both the free market and social welfare. Strong enforcement of anti-trust laws is a critical step to decentralizing and strengthening our food supply.
We call for enforcement of existing regulations to protect the environment and address food safety. We also call for a recognition that many of the problems that the regulations seek to address are caused by large, industrial agriculture practices. Small, sustainable farms and food processors do not cause these problems and should not be burdened with unnecessary and expensive regulations. Small, local farmers are stewards of the land and water and provide safe and nutritious food, and the regulatory system should address them independently of the centralized, industrial agriculture system.
Economic Fairness
We oppose NAFTA, CAFTA and the other various free trade agreements (FTAs) as they undermine our nation's economy. They might benefit the multinational corporations but the rest of us aren't feeling too much trickling down as we watch our jobs go to Mexico.
Our government must enforce the Sherman Anti-Trust Act and the Packers & Stockyards Act. Monopolies are not good for capitalism. We resent the high amount of consolidation in so many industries and we look to an Obama administration to break them up.
We want to see executives who hire undocumented workers to face severe penalties. They are not only taking away jobs from Americans, they are also often violating human rights by hiring the most helpless class of workers. Undocumented workers who are abused on the job cannot sue, often they cannot speak English, and they work under the threat of deportation. Those who abuse them and profit from their hard work deserve to be penalized for it.
Enormous, industrial farms should be held accountable for the environmental damage they cause. It is not fair that we allow a huge farm to pollute drinking water with fertilizer and/or manure runoff and then taxpayers pay to clean the water to make it drinkable. That is, in essence, a tax subsidy freely given (but never recognized) to factory farms. The EPA must be funded appropriately so that the Clean Air and Clean Water Acts can be enforced (and both acts should be stiffened as appropriate to hold polluters accountable so that tax payers don't end up with the bill for their pollution).
Congress should pass the "packer ban," a law prohibiting meat processors from owning livestock. The meatpacking industry is highly, highly consolidated and farmers already struggle to sell their animals for fair prices. When the enormous meatpackers also own livestock (and thus compete with the farmers), the system becomes even more monopolistic and unfair to the farmers.
Local Food
The government must actively promote sustainable local food systems for a number of reasons: to combat global warming, to ensure better food safety, to provide access to healthy food for all Americans, and to reduce our dependence on foreign oil. Some methods the government should use to do this include:
Significantly increase mandatory funding for the Community Food Projects competitive grant program (ideally from $5 million to $30 million). This program is an incredible bargain for taxpayers as it promotes local food without increasing the size of government bureaucracy, allows for local control over programs, and establishes local food programs that are financially independent after their initial period receiving federal grant money.
Increase funding for the USDA's Risk Management Agency's Community Outreach Partnership Program far beyond its previous level of $8. 3 million before recent budget cuts. This program helps out the nation's most at-risk farmers and populations and produces tangible benefits in the form of increased community food security and healthier local food systems.
Fund schools so they may build gardens, add kitchen facilities, hire kitchen staff, and purchase food from local farms. Make sure that schools do not have to teach to a test (as they do under No Child Left Behind) in such a way that they cannot offer any elective curricula, such as a gardening program.
Food Safety
Part of national security is being able to trust that food from stores and restaurants are safe. Too often now, the burden of food safety is put on the consumer (i.e. it's OK if the store sells you beef with E. coli and it's your job to cook it thoroughly) and this is not OK. Food safety needs to begin on the farm.
Studies show that we can drastically reduce E. coli in beef by changing the cows' diet from grain to alfalfa 3 days before slaughter. Americans die from E. coli 0157:H7 in ground beef; there is no reason we should not be taking this crucial step to save American lives.
Another way to improve safety is to slow down the lines in meatpacking plants. Meatpackers increase line speed to increase profits, but they do so at the expense of worker safety and food safety. E. coli does not get into the meat without a mistake occurring during processing, either contaminating the meat from manure on the cow's hide or in the gut. Decreasing line speed will decrease mistakes.
As Democrats, we should NOT support the ridiculous National Animal ID System as it does NOT improve food safety. By implementing an expensive, invasive tracking system without making the other needed changes in our food system, we will not do anything at all to improve our safety. All NAIS does do is invade privacy and push small farmers out of business.
We should regulate what animals are allowed to eat. Currently, even though we know that feeding animal remains to animals causes mad cow, we still tolerate several loopholes in our system. For example, cows can eat pigs and pigs can eat cows. Calves often eat cow blood. We need to examine this and close the remaining loopholes.
Additionally, there are other things American agricultural animals eat that are banned in Europe with good reason (like chickens and arsenic). We must examine those and ban substances that should not be in the food chain.
Individual farmers should be allowed to test their cows for mad cow if they so choose. Currently, farmers who wish to test every cow for mad cow in order to do business with Japan are not permitted to do so. This is insane. Why are we preventing our farmers from increasing the safety of our food supply?
We need to adopt policies that actively promote small farms, farmers' markets, farm to school programs, and other local, decentralized food systems. We are sick of seeing outbreaks like this latest Salmonella outbreak, in which over 1000 people were affected across the country. When we promote local food systems, we also help citizens avoid the food safety issues that arise from our centralized, industrialized system.
Food Labeling
Consumers should have the right to know what is in their food so they may make educated choices about what to eat. We propose the following:
Label foods that contain genetically-modified ingredients. Consumers are generally unaware that 70% of food in America contains GMOs and they have a right to know.
Label added sugars in foods. Often a food (for example, blueberry yogurt) will contain both natural sugars (in the blueberries and milk) and added sugars (i.e. sugar or high fructose corn syrup). Currently the label shows only the total amount of sugar, which is not always helpful to a consumer trying to make healthy food choices. When eating blueberries or milk, one eats sugar but he or she also gets fiber, protein, and important vitamins at the same time. When one eats added sugar, he or she gets no nutritional benefit. Establishing a recommended amount of 10 teaspoons of added sugar per day for someone who eats a 2000 calorie diet and labeling added sugars would help consumers understand the impact of their food choices more effectively.
Label all milk that comes from cows treated with rBGH (recombinant bovine growth hormone). Also, allow dairies to label products that are rBGH-free. Some consumers wish to avoid milk from treated cows because such milk contains significantly higher levels of a hormone known as IGF-1 (potentially linked to cancer) than milk from untreated cows. Others wish to avoid milk from treated cows because they feel the hormone is inhumane to the animals. Consumers have a right to know how their milk was produced.
Regulate and limit call outs and health claims made on foods. The current trend of labeling cookies that are nutritionally worthless as "whole grain" or "trans fat free" aims to mislead consumers that such products are healthy. Other foods make even bolder claims that they can support or promote a particular body structure or function (i.e. supports respiratory function), leading consumers to purchase food for medicinal benefits when in fact the foods were never required to prove the claims on the labels are true.