USDA Approves Poultry Industry Self Inspections – Get ready for the diarrhea

Filed in National by on August 1, 2014

Diarrhea will actually be one of the milder outcomes, because all of the evidence provided by the history of capitalism says that this is going to fail, and fail catastrophically.

Poultry inspection, prepare to modernized. Or, if you prefer, privatized. The USDA late Thursday released its revamped poultry inspection rules, an overhaul to the 60-year-old system which, by allowing plants to self-inspect, it claims will simultaneously reduce the number of federal inspectors on site and incidences of foodborne illness.

No Tax revenue, no problem. Ultimately, you’ll pay one way or another.

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Jason330 is a deep cover double agent working for the GOP. Don't tell anybody.

Comments (14)

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  1. Perception is Reality says:

    I knew this was going to happen; more than two years ago, actually before the last election the NYT and other news agencies reported the billion dollar push the industry was making to deregulate. Well, it’s good for the Kosher industry — it is the only poultry that has strict regulations to the facilities and the people. This moves us further away from automation; consumers will have no other choice to eat organically and naturally grown foods.

  2. Steve Newton says:

    For the record–this is not privatization of the inspection process, this is corporatization.

    The difference is that real privatization would require a completely separate company doing the inspecting that had no relation to the company being inspected, and it would have to post a performance bond (probably equal to 25-50% of the company’s net worth) to guarantee the quality of its work.

    This is just another incident in the increasing corporatization of government and services designed neither to make anyone healthier or safer, but simply to reduce costs and eliminate liability in order to favor the interests of a specific elite.

  3. HoHum says:

    Self-inspections in any industry such is. HVAC companies self inspect in Delaware. Does anyone think for a second they will ever find something wrong? What a joke! Time to give up chicken!

  4. Jason330 says:

    It is another move toward a two tiered America. Wealthy people can afford organic (inspected) food and the not wealthy get to play Russian roulette.

  5. cassandra_m says:

    Self inspections in most other industries are also subject to documentation — and assurances to the buyer that the installation or building is as spec’ed. Those assurances also mean something — as in if the system fails, the installer can be held accountable.

    Chicken that fails inspection is a public health threat. Not just to you, but to everyone else who buys it. Frankly, I don’t mind if they want to have the companies do the inspection of chicken. They should just create enough incentive for these companies to take it seriously (as in making these companies live with all of the liability).

  6. puck says:

    So we will be eating undocument chicken handled by undocumented workers.

  7. John Kowalko says:

    This action was taken some months ago and was ignored (and still is) by the media and the public. This is a frightening policy.

    Recently passed federal regulations make it impossible for you to know just where your chicken has been. Even if it is Made in the USA it may be traveling 7,000 miles to China to be processed just to come back here to be sold.

    At the Hausbar Farm they know plenty about chickens.

    We’re organic, said Dorsey Barger of the Hausbar Farm. We don’t use any petrochemicals on the farm whatsoever.

    She also knows what not to.

    It’s the worst way we could possibly produce food, said Barger.

    Barger is talking about a quietly passed federal rule that now allows chickens like hers born in Texas, or anywhere in the U.S., to be shipped to China to be processed and shipped back here to be eaten.

    All that without any mention to you.

    This is a country that has a very poor safety record and the question is why on earth would we do that, said Bettina Siegal.

    She is the Houston mother and food safety blogger that was responsible for raising awareness of so called pink slime processed filler meat made from slaughterhouse scraps in 2012 and she thinks the chicken shipping issue is worse.

    We’ll never know about it and that’s really troubling, said Siegal.

    Parents like Shannon Johns who depend on chicken to keep picky kids happy are worried too.

    Our safety records are much better, said Johns. So we try and steer clear of the stuff that’s made abroad. Because you don’t know what’s in it.

    She buys made in the USA but under these new rules, no I ve been to China or any labels are required.

    I don’t like that, said Johns. It just seems weird to me that they would slaughter them, package them up, and send them abroad, to be broken down and sent back. It just seems silly.

    But believe it or not it might be cheaper, and the farmers know it.

    Because the labor in China is so much less expensive than the labor here that it actually does make some sick economic sense to ship our food all the way across the world and back to us again, said Barger.

    Siegal thinks she knows why this is all happening.

    In 2003 China stopped importing beef from the U.S. because of a mad cow scare, and so now there’s pressure from China to let us take their chicken in exchange for them opening up their markets back up to U.S. beef, said Siegal.

    The problem activists say is safety because chicken by nature can be dangerous.

    It carries bacteria which can make you very sick that is why right there on the package there are plenty of warning labels about that.

    There are numerous examples of tainted foods in China being sold and consumed making people sick, everything from tainted meat to baby formula tainted with mercury.

    Just last year Chinese food safety officials said in a press conference that it was not fair to hold China to American safety standards.

    This is a country that has a food safety record that is decades behind ours, said Siegal. It’s widely believed this is the first step in the process allowing china to ship us chicken it raises and slaughters there.

    We don’t have the right to know anything anymore, said Barger. Labeling is so important and we’re getting further away from the truth about our food instead of getting closer to the truth about our food.

    That is no matter how many stops, or miles, or countries from the farm to your table.

  8. Steve Newton says:

    I read somewhere about six months ago (and I’ve been trying to find the link unsuccessfully this morning) that four major corporations control 90% of the beef products for sale in this country, and that six major corporations control about 85% of the chicken products. I suspect there is some overlap between the two sets of corporations, but let’s assume not. So that’s ten corporations controlling the meat/poultry market.

    Of course, as in health insurance, this is deceiving, because this breaks down into 4 or 5 effective regional monopolies or duopolies in which–despite different appearing packages and brand names–customers are pretty much choosing from different product lines by the same producers (including “store” brands).

    And, of course, all of these ten corporations are (a) gigantic campaign contributors; (b) recipients of massive corporate welfare; and (c) probably have provided most of the senior staff for the US Department of Agriculture and USDA over the past two decades on a revolving door basis as the party holding the presidency changed.

    So here’s a thought (that will never be enacted): three-pronged legislation that (a) eliminates all corporate agricultural subsidies and tax breaks as long as food inspection regimes are not fully funded; (b) requires all agricultural corporations to post a bond worth approximately 20% of their net worth to be used as initial funds for remediation in cases of contamination; and (c) when inspection regimes are funded, restrict corporate agricultural subsidies to those entities that do less than $20 million in business and who publicly reveal all beneficial owners.

  9. kavips says:

    Sounds like we will be paying for this out the ass.

  10. jason330 says:

    *golf clap*

  11. John Young says:

    Seriously, this is exactly what DCAS is. Tests administered by the people held responsible for the results…by design.

    As we used to say when we were kids: same difference.

    Also, just a big a public threat, a uneducated populace that is.

  12. Aint's Taking it Any More says:

    What I find interesting here is that the outrage is at the prospect of corporate self-regulation/reporting and NOT on angry word on which political allowed it to happen.

    Just an observation. Explanations welcome.

  13. jason330 says:

    What are you fishing for? The USDA’s budget has been cut to the bone by congress. They haven’t hired any new inspectors in 10 years. What are they supposed to do?

    I’m angry at idiot voters. We are a nation of suckers who have internalized the lie that the government is too big.

  14. Aint's Taking it Any More says:

    Fishing for an explanation. Nothing more