Stripping States' Rights for GM

DTN Ag Policy May 25, 2007
Provision Would Strip States of Control

The House Subcommittee on Livestock, Dairy and Poultry passed on the full committee on Thursday a briefly-worded provision that could have huge ramifications for the abilities of state and local governments to effectively oversee anything involving agriculture.

Under the heading Miscellaneous Provisions, Sec. 123 USDA Inspection and Determination of Non-Regulated Status, the subcommittee approved a provision that would ban a state or locality from "prohibiting an article the Secretary of Agriculture has inspected and passed, or an article the Secretary has determined to be of non-regulated status."

The provision passed on to the full committee without discussion. It's a brief statement that, based on the interpretation, could prevent a state from establishing rules tighter than USDA or protecting the interests of local producers. It would seem as well the tiny provision would also tell states they don't have any right adopt food-safety or recall standards.

This proposed restriction on the rights of states is being offered at the same time dozens of lawmakers are pushing to allow state-inspected meat to be sold across the country. So on one hand, Congress is trying to clamp down on they way a state can regulate and on the other hand, Congress wants to give states more authority over meat inspections.

The Center for Food Safety was about the only group to challenge the intent of this proposal. The center stated in a news alert that the provision appears to be aimed at enacted state laws that restrict the planting of genetically engineered crops.

Further, the provision could prohibit states from taking action when food contamination cases occur, the center pointed out. This biotech battle in a variety of states. Some, such as Iowa, Nebraska and others have passed legislation making sure local counties cannot adopt their own biotech planting bans.

Voters in at least four California counties passed such measures, leading biotech seed and chemical companies to go into action and get lawmakers to make sure such bans could not occur in major biotech crop states.

Still, states in recent years have had to take action to protect the interests of markets, even when USDA has approved a product. Rice, in particular, comes to mind. Lawmakers in Arkansas, Missouri and California have created legislation against biotech rice because USDA approved a product that, if grown, would have caused major international or domestic commodity buyers to stop buying rice from those states.

In other situations, USDA regulators didn't do enough to ensure companies prevented the spread of an unapproved product into the general crop planting. Arkansas, not exactly a bastion of liberal, locally-grown, organic consumerism, had to take action because two of its best varieties of long-grain rice were contaminated. European countries have continued to kick back shipments because of that.

It's not known at this point why this provision was added or ended up in the purview of a subcommittee on livestock, poultry or dairy. But if such a law is needed and would effectively strip authority from states and counties to follow the wishes of voters or the needs of their farmers, then shouldn't such a proposal demand a hearing, open debate and discussion before Congress offers a new, broad power to the Secretary of Agriculture with fewer than 40 words in the farm bill?