Debate and voting on The Food Safety Modernization Act (S. 510) is set to begin on the Senate floor tomorrow, November 17th. The bill takes important steps to improve corporate food safety rules but it is not appropriate for small farms and processors that sell to restaurants, food coops, groceries, schools, wholesalers and at farm stands and farmers markets.

These family farms should have food safety plans appropriate to their size and processing practices. It is critical that as we ramp up food safety protections we don’t inadvertently do harm to family farm value-added processing and the growing investments in local and regional food systems by imposing expensive, one-size-fits-all rules catered to the biggest and most industrial farms.

Two amendments will be offered when S. 510 comes to the floor and both are essential to protecting family farmers of all sizes and the local and regional food systems they serve.

Please call your Senators and ask them to:
• Vote for the Manager’s Amendment
• Vote for the Tester-Hagan Amendment

It’s easy to call: Go to Congress.org and type in your zip code. Click on your Senator’s name, and then on the contact tab for their phone number.

You can also call the Capitol Switchboard and ask to be directly connected to your Senator’s office: 202-224-3121.

The message is simple: “I am a constituent of Senator___________ and I am calling to ask him/her to vote for the Manager’s Amendment and the Tester–Hagan Amendment to the Food Safety Modernization Act. We need a food safety bill that cracks down on corporate bad actors without erecting new barriers to more local and regional food sourcing. Size and practice appropriate food safety regulation for small and mid-sized farms and processors is vital to economic recovery, public health, and nutritional well-being.”

Please make your calls today in order to ensure that our family farmers can continue to bring us the good food we all want!