Food Dye Bans Should Be Left to the States

By Raymond J. March. He is a Research Fellow and Director of FDAReview.org at the Independent Institute. He is a Professor of Economics at North Dakota State University.

"This January, the Food and Drug Administration announced Red Dye #3 (a synthetic food dye) must be removed from all food products by January 2027. It was a strange decision. 

Red Dye #3 has been used to make food redder since 1907. To date, Red Dye #3 has only been clinically linked to lead to cancer in lab rats—never in humans. Notwithstanding, the use of Red Dye #3 has been in decline since the late 1980s due to health-related concerns. 

This was just the beginning. 

In April, the FDA announced a more ambitious plan to phase out eight additional food dyes, with some bans coming “within the coming months.” The press release also indicates that the FDA will fast-track the authorization of four new natural color additives and work with the National Institutes of Health to study the impact of food dyes on childhood behavior. 

Banning a variety of food dyes has long been one of the top priorities for Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who is quoted in the same press release as saying:

These poisonous compounds offer no nutritional benefit and pose real, measurable dangers to our children’s health and development. That era is coming to an end. We’re restoring gold-standard science, applying common sense, and beginning to earn back the public’s trust. And we’re doing it by working with industry to get these toxic dyes out of the foods our families eat

RFK Jr.’s intentions are understandable. His approach of having the central government decide what products to ban and what to replace them with is anything but the “gold standard.” Instead, it’s an easy-to-replicate and repeatedly failed experiment. 

Numerous state-initiated guidelines to recommend healthy diets and provide better nutrition labels have had little success. FDA and HHS financial support and revised approval guidelines to develop nicotine replacement therapies to help patients beat nicotine addiction have gone up in smoke. 

Instead, food dye bans and regulations would be much better addressed at the state level, where many complex health decisions have been regulated without FDA involvement.

Several states and many cities began banning artificial trans-fats in 2010. The FDA did not issue a ban until 2015. Before it became federal law, 41 states enacted right-to-try laws, which grant terminally ill patients access to potentially life-saving experimental medication. Many states differ from the federally recommended vaccine schedules and provide their own. Well before RFK Jr.’s appointment, eleven states enacted legislation to remove food dyes from public school lunches and other products. California specifically banned Red Dye #3 two years ago. 

State-led efforts to address and regulate complicated health policies are far from perfect. But they can vastly outperform federal efforts with the same goals. 

Before 2016, states were tasked with regulating e-cigarette sales, including preventing retailers from selling to minors. After 2016, the FDA initiated a federal effort to prevent younger demographic vaping use from becoming an epidemic. Teenage and middle school-aged vaping rates increased afterward. 

Whether and how food dyes impact our health is a complicated question and we could easily be decades away from reaching a scientific consensus. However, any complex question in health or public policy is better addressed with experimentation and varied approaches. A federal ban provides the opposite."    

From Nutrition to Nannying: Texas SB 25 and the New Public Health Overreach

By Jeffrey A. Singer of Cato. Excerpt:

"A group representing 60 members of the food industry wrote a letter to Texas lawmakers urging them to reject the bill, arguing it “could destabilize local and regional economies at a time when businesses are already fighting to keep prices down, maintain inventory, and avoid layoffs.” The Consumer Brands Association stated in a letter to Governor Abbott urging him to veto the bill:

The ingredients used in the US food supply are safe and have been rigorously studied following an objective science and risk-based evaluation process. The labeling requirements of SB 25 mandate inaccurate warning language, create legal risks for brands and drive consumer confusion and higher costs.

Emerging research links certain ingredients in ultra-processed foods to health risks, but the science is still in its early stages. Most evidence comes from animal or observational studies, which cannot prove cause and effect. Ingredients can vary significantly across products, and factors such as dose, frequency, and individual susceptibility complicate the identification of specific harms. Additionally, it’s challenging to separate the effects of one ingredient from those of others in these complex food mixtures.

Like the architects of the now-discredited Food Pyramid, the MAHA movement—and Texas lawmakers—are rushing to judgment based on assumptions and intuition. But policy should follow evidence, not vibes.

More significant than any economic costs or unintended health effects is the bill’s substantial expansion of government control over personal choices. My book, Your Body, Your Health Care, emphasizes the importance of individual autonomy and illustrates how, in recent decades, government overreach has increasingly eroded the relationship between patients and their health care providers.

A key idea in liberal thought is the harm principle, laid out by John Stuart Mill in On Liberty. He argued that the only reason to limit someone’s freedom is to prevent harm to others—not for their own good. This principle frequently arises in policy debates about health and safety, where the government intervenes not to protect people from themselves but to reduce harm to others, such as secondhand smoke or contagious diseases."

Upton Sinclair engaged in “willful and deliberate misrepresentations of fact”

Letter to The WSJ. 

"“Laws, like sausages, cease to inspire respect in proportion as we know how they are made.” John Godfrey Saxe’s quip certainly applies to the Meat Inspection Act of 1906, legislation meant to clean up Chicago’s meat-packing industry (“‘The Jungle’ Is a Cautionary Tale for DOGE” by Peggy Noonan, Declarations, March 15).

In reality, the Beef Trust improved sanitation in slaughterhouses. It replaced wooden cattle pens with brick structures, revamped sewage systems, minimized dust through electrical power and reduced waste in the Chicago River by making by-products from carcasses. Canned meat products and preservatives decreased spoilage, bacterial contamination and monotonous diets. The Beef Trust likewise reduced prices for ordinary Americans.

These innovations incurred the wrath of smaller butchers, cattle ranchers and reformers like Upton Sinclair. He was an avowed socialist who wanted to write a sensationalist book on wage slavery. The official report by the Bureau of Animal Industry noted that he engaged in “willful and deliberate misrepresentations of fact.” The law encouraged industry consolidation in the Beef Trust by, among other things, imposing new costly sanitary requirements on smaller competitors.

Contrary to popular history, the saga of the Beef Trust is a great example of how free-market capitalism improves the lives of ordinary Americans while government intervention makes things worse.

Prof. Patrick Newman

University of Tampa

Tampa, Fla"

Conventional Produce is Safe to Eat, and Isn't Covered in Harmful Pesticides

The USDA pesticide residue report demonstrates the safety of conventionally grown produce, contrary to claims of anti-science activists like the Environmental Working Group

By Andrea Love of The American Council on Science and Health. Excerpts:

"The National Organic Program (NOP), established by the passage of the US Organic Foods Production Act of 1990 (OFPA), is a program managed by the USDA that sets standards for what qualifies as organic farming, the rules and criteria for what farming and growing practices qualify a farm for the USDA Organic certification. That’s it. It does not mean practices are better, safer, more eco-friendly, more nutritious, or pesticide-free. (There is an extensive list of permitted pesticides and fertilizers for organic farming.)"

"The NOP centers around personal beliefs and perceived values, often focusing on “natural” substances perceived by consumers as “clean,” which mislead consumers using clever marketing ploys. As a result, people believe that organic is superior, uses fewer chemicals, leads to improved products, and is safer.

Unfortunately, that isn’t true. Many modern synthetic pesticides have taken natural chemicals (that are used as organic pesticides) and improved upon them using science to reduce environmental harm, off-target effects, and overall safety."

"pesticides used in conventional farming that are synthetic chemicals are regulated by the EPA and require extensive data on toxicity, environmental impact, and efficacy before approval. The USDA also manages the Pesticide Data Program (PDP), which publishes an annual residue report. The PDP is a monitoring program that assesses trace residuals of synthetic pesticides used in conventional farming. It was created in 1991 because of public outcry and misinformation about synthetic versus natural pesticides.

The false belief that “natural chemicals” are inherently safe and chemophobia aimed at synthetic chemicals means the USDA PDP residue report only includes synthetic pesticide residues used in conventional farming; organic pesticides are excluded from this regulatory oversight. Weird, right?"

"Residue levels are monitored and reported, and every year, the report demonstrates the safety of conventionally-grown produce. The residue levels tested for and reported are not levels that should concern you. If anything, the USDA’s annual Pesticide Data Program (PDP) report should give you confidence that not only are farmers using as little pesticide application as possible to grow your foods and post-harvest processing of crops reduces any trace levels to minuscule quantities. Every year, over 99% of tested samples are below safety thresholds for each pesticide in question. Last year’s report demonstrates the same. Not only did over 99% of samples tested meet all safety criteria, but 38.8% of the thousands of samples monitored had no detectable pesticide residues."

"Consider a hypothetical. Say you see the EWG’s Dirty Dozen list and their claim blackberries are “dirty” according to their wildly misleading and anti-science methods. How many blackberries would you need to eat to even pose a risk?

In this instance, you have to convert the pesticide tolerance level to the acceptable daily intake (ADI), the amount of a substance that a human could ingest every day for their entire life and experience no adverse effects. The ADI level for malathion, set by the World Health Organization is 0.3 mg/kg/day. [2]

A person weighing 70 kg (154 lbs) would have to ingest 21 milligrams of malathion daily to reach the ADI. If we eat blackberries with the highest level detected at 0.45 ppm (0.45 milligrams of malathion per 1,000 grams (kg) of blackberries), that 70 kg individual would need to eat 46.7 kilograms, over 90 pounds of blackberries daily to reach malathion’s ADI."

"We can detect levels of substances that are irrelevant to our health, measured in units like parts per million, parts per billion, or parts per trillion. We have to compare those detected levels to their potential risk and your potential exposure.

This is a fundamental challenge when discussing pesticides or, really, any chemical (even though everything is chemicals).

The challenge is made worse when groups like the EWG take these minuscule quantities of detected pesticides and manipulate them to scare people from perfectly safe and more affordable conventional foods (read their methods here).

Of course, EWG is funded by large organic farming industry partners"

The FDA has approved nine synthetic color additives for use in food

See How Froot Loops Landed at the Center of U.S. Food Politics by Jesse Newman of The WSJ. Excerpt:

"The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has approved nine synthetic color additives for use in food, and said they are safe when used in accordance with FDA regulations. The FDA said the totality of scientific evidence shows that most children experience no adverse effects from eating foods with the added colors, though some evidence suggests certain children may be sensitive to them. 

Kellogg said its products and ingredients comply with all relevant laws and regulations. The company said more than 85% of its sales come from cereals that don’t contain colors from artificial sources."

Governor DeSantis Tells Residents of the “Free State of Florida” What Kind of Meat He Will Allow Them to Eat

By Jeffrey A. Singer of Cato.

"On May 1, Florida Governor Ron DeSantis (R) signed SB 1084 into law, which prohibits Floridians from buying or selling lab‐​grown meat. In a press release, the governor’s office stated, “Florida is increasing meat production” and urged Floridians to “continue to consume and enjoy 100 percent Florida beef.”

To his credit, unlike his culture war opponents who oppose genetically modified foods, the governor did not engage in hysterical junk science arguments about the safety of eating lab‐​grown meat.

Medical researchers and clinicians have been culturing and growing human tissue in laboratories for decades. In some cases, clinical researchers and oncologists cultivate tissue samples obtained from individuals’ tumors to study their unique biology and the effects that various therapeutic agents have on them.

It was only a matter of time before entrepreneurs applied the same technology to growing animal tissue, which enabled humans to consume meat without raising and slaughtering animals.

Historically, many early opponents of genetically modified foods were associated with left‐​wing politics, who claimed these foods were “an unnatural plot by evil capitalists to enslave food eaters.” Activists claimed genetically modified foods, which they often dubbed “Frankenfood,” were unhealthful. However, there is solid evidence that genetically modified foods are safe.

This time, opposition to lab‐​grown meat seems to be coming from right‐​wing culture warriors, the agriculture lobby, and politicians who pander to them. Lab‐​grown meat critics don’t challenge evidence that it is safe to eat. Rather they oppose lab‐​grown meat mainly because environmentalists and animal rights activists generally like the idea. Though recent studies suggest they may be wrong, many environmentalists have believed that growing meat will decrease the need for raising methane‐​producing cattle, thus helping to ease global warming. Animal rights activists promote lab‐​grown meat as an alternative to slaughtering animals.

But the culture war is not all that animates those opposing lab‐​grown meat. Another factor is good old‐​fashioned protectionism. Just as the taxi cartels united to oppose Uber and Lyft, many in the beef and poultry industries fear competition from lab‐​grown meat. The Florida governor’s press release was quite transparent on this in stating:

We must protect our incredible farmers and the integrity of American agriculture. Lab‐​grown meat is a disgraceful attempt to undermine our proud traditions and prosperity, and is in direct opposition to authentic agriculture.

Protectionism makes for strange political bedfellows. Commenting on Florida’s new lab‐​grown meat prohibition, Senator John Fetterman (D‑PA) posted on X:

Pains me deeply to agree with Crash‐​and‐​Burn Ron, but I co‐​sign this. As a member of @SenateAgDems.and as some dude who would never serve that slop to my kids, I stand with our American ranchers and farmers.

I can’t criticize opponents of lab‐​grown meat for making unscientific claims about its safety, but I can certainly point out the hypocrisy of their claim to be pro‐​freedom."

Greenpeace still fights golden rice

See Greenpeace’s Vile War on the Poor and Vulnerable by Henry I. Miller, MS, MD and Rob Wager. Henry I. Miller, MS, MD, is the Glenn Swogger Distinguished Fellow at the American Council on Science and Health. Dr. Miller served for fifteen years at the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA). Rob Wager is retired from the Department of Biology at Vancouver Island University. Excerpts: 

"For years, Greenpeace’s prodigious PR machine has been spearheading an effort to deny millions of children in the poorest nations an essential nutrient they need to stave off blindness and death. A precursor of that nutrient, vitamin A, has been introduced ingeniously into genetically engineered rice (“Golden Rice”). (It is readily converted into vitamin A in the body.) However, we’re getting ahead of ourselves.

Farmers and consumers in less-developed countries will benefit most from the myriad improvements of genetically engineered (GE) plants. Many varieties of GE plants improve food security, which is most critical in less-developed countries, where the success of a crop can literally spell the difference between starvation and survival. In their 1999 Canadian federal tax filings, Greenpeace admitted that they seek not the prudent, safe use of GE foods or even their labeling; instead, they demand nothing less than these products’ “complete elimination [from] the food supply and the environment.”

When asked if future scientific research could change their position, Lord Melchett, the head of Greenpeace, said: “I am happy to answer for Greenpeace…It is permanent and definite and complete opposition…” As Patrick Moore said, science was no longer important to Greenpeace.

A prominent target of Greenpeace has long been new GE plant varieties collectively called “Golden Rice.” Rice is a food staple and a primary source of calories for hundreds of millions, especially in Asia. Although it is an excellent source of calories, it lacks certain micronutrients necessary for a complete diet. In the 1980s and ’90s, German scientists Ingo Potrykus and Peter Beyer developed the “Golden Rice” varieties that are biofortified, or enriched, by genes that produce beta-carotene, the precursor of vitamin A.

The World Health Organization estimates that 250 million people suffer from Vitamin A Deficiency (VAD), including 40 percent of children under five in the developing world. VAD is epidemic among poor people whose diet is mainly composed of rice, which contains no beta-carotene or vitamin A. In developing countries, 200 to 300 million children of preschool age are at risk of vitamin A deficiency, which increases their susceptibility to illnesses, including measles and diarrheal diseases. Every year, about half a million children become blind as a result of vitamin A deficiency, and 70% of those die within a year.

Greenpeace’s campaign against Golden Rice has had devastating consequences in the developing world. Completely divorced from science  and reason, they continue to lobby against the regulatory approval and distribution of GE crops in developing countries. Golden Rice is still banned in India. An analysis  by academics Justus Wesseler and David Zilberman almost a decade ago found that  1.4 million child years had been lost due to the delays in the release of Golden Rice in India alone. 

Golden Rice could thus make contributions to human health comparable to Jonas Salk’s polio vaccine. Instead, anti-technology groups such as Greenpeace have given already risk-averse regulators the political cover to delay approvals."

"Greenpeace and others who are more interested in slogans than evidence and positive outcomes have not been swayed by the scientific consensus about the safety of GE crops — a consensus that is the result not only of innumerable reports by scholarly groups but also of thousands of risk-assessment experiments and vast real-world experience. In the United States alone, more than 90% of all cultivated corn, cotton, canola, soy, and sugar beets have been modified with molecular genetic engineering techniques (with similar numbers in Canada), and in several decades of consumption around the world, not a single health or environmental problem has been documented."

"Greenpeace has variously alleged that the levels of beta-carotene, the precursor of vitamin A, in Golden Rice are too low to be effective or so high that they would be toxic. However, feeding trials have shown the rice to be highly effective in preventing vitamin A deficiency, and toxicity is virtually impossible."

"In 2016, 160 Nobel laureates penned a letter  imploring Greenpeace to stop its baseless, cynical, and harmful activism:

We urge Greenpeace and its supporters to re-examine the experience of farmers and consumers worldwide with crops and foods improved through biotechnology, recognize the findings of authoritative scientific bodies and regulatory agencies, and abandon their campaign against “GMOs” in general and Golden Rice in particular.

Greenpeace ignored the plea, of course, and continued their campaign against Golden Rice."

NEW DATA: No Foodborne Illness Reported in Seven States That Allow Sale of Homemade Perishable Food

By Dan King of the Institute for Justice. 

"New data, released today by the Institute for Justice (IJ), show states that permit home cooks to sell perishable foods do not see an increase in foodborne illnesses. The data, obtained through Freedom of Information Act requests in the seven states with the broadest homemade food laws, show that none of these states have ever confirmed any cases of foodborne illness attributed to food sold under their homemade food programs. 

The seven states which were studied—California, Iowa, Montana, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Utah, and Wyoming—all permit homemade food producers to sell not only shelf-stable foods, like breads and jam, but also perishables, such as tamales and pizza.  

“Opponents of expanding food freedom have long argued that allowing homemade food sales would lead to increases in foodborne illnesses, but these data show there is no evidence behind those claims,” said IJ Senior Attorney Erica Smith Ewing. “Not only are homemade food producers making delicious food, they’re doing so in a way that is safe for consumers.” 

Not only did the data show zero confirmed cases of foodborne illness for the entire time the homemade food laws have been in place, they also showed barely any suspected cases of foodborne illness. Across the seven states, there were only two instances of suspected foodborne illness, neither of which were confirmed to be from homemade food producers and neither of which were considered serious. 

“These data should encourage other states to loosen their restrictions on homemade food producers, so more Americans can share their culinary creations and earn an honest living in the process,” said IJ Assistant Director of Activism Jennifer McDonald. 

While all seven states that were surveyed permit the sale of perishable foods, they all have slightly different regulatory environments. Three of the seven—Montana, North Dakota, and Wyoming—allow sales with no permit required and minimal government oversight. Oklahoma has a $75,000 annual cap on gross sales and requires home cooks to take a food safety course. California and Iowa have additional requirements, such as kitchen inspections by the local health department. Lastly, Utah requires permits and inspections for meat products, but not other perishables such as vegetable lasagna or cheesecakes. Of these states, Wyoming’s law has been in place the longest, being enacted in 2015. 

IJ is the nation’s leading advocate for food freedom. Through litigation and legislation, it has helped reform cottage food laws in more than 25 states. IJ successfully sued New Jersey and Wisconsin, leading both states to remove their bans on the sale of cottage foods. In addition, IJ recently helped a bipartisan cottage food reform pass through the Arizona legislature, before it was unfortunately vetoed for unfounded “safety” reasons by the governor. IJ also recently expanded food freedom in California and Oregon."

Tariffs on Baby Formula Returned. So Did the Shortages

By Eric Boehm of Reason.

"When supply chain issues caused a baby formula shortage last year, Congress (eventually) cut tariffs to help get more formula onto American store shelves.

It worked! Imports of baby formula soared during the second half of 2022 after tariffs and other regulations were lifted. Stores reported lower out-of-stock rates and news stories about panicked parents being unable to feed their infants abated. In short, the government removed economic barriers and the market solved the problem.

Then, the government put those barriers back in place. On January 1, the tariffs on baby formula returned. Now, so has the crisis.

"It's getting harder and harder" to find baby formula, pharmacy owner Anil Datwani told Fox News this week. "[Mothers] go from one store to the next store to the next store" looking for baby formula.

Meanwhile, some consumers are complaining on social media that prices for baby formula have suddenly spiked and availability is once again a problem. A Forbes investigation into a recent increase in the price of Enfamil baby formula noted that the increases "follow the expiration of the U.S. government's suspension of infant formula tariffs in January, which opened the door for formula (both foreign and U.S.-produced) to become more expensive." (Another contributing factor: Reckitt Benckiser, the British-based company that owns the Enfamil brand, issued a recall in February affecting about 145,000 cans of formula.)

Because that's what tariffs do, of course. They are import taxes that protect domestic industries at the expense of domestic consumers, who are subjected to limited supply and higher prices as a trade-off for industrial protectionism.

"Families who use imported formula aren't the only ones who suffer because of these taxes," because the tariff-induced price increases create an opportunity for domestic producers to raise prices too, explains Reason contributor Bonnie Kristian in a piece at The Daily Beast. "For instance, if tariffs make the price of European formula go from $24 to $30 a jar, U.S. producers that might otherwise have charged $25 can hike their prices to $27. Even with the 'cheaper' American option, you're paying more."

It's obviously a bad deal for consumers, but one that's often invisible. The baby formula shortage has changed that and made the costs of this specific trade policy readily apparent.

It has also revealed the ways in which special interests pull the strings on many protectionist policies. In this case, it was the dairy industry, which benefits from the anti-competitive tariffs and other regulations that effectively prevent foreign baby formula from being sold in America. As Reason reported in December, the National Milk Producers Federation pushed Congress to reimplement the baby formula tariffs, arguing at the time that "the temporary production shortfall that gripped American families in need of formula earlier this year has abated."

Except, obviously, it hasn't.

Meanwhile, on Tuesday, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) announced new plans to "increase the resiliency of the U.S. infant formula market," including new regulations, more inspections of manufacturing facilities, and an expedited review process for new products seeking to enter the market. The FDA also promised to examine "other factors that may influence the infant formula supply, such as tariffs and market concentration" but did not promise to take any particular steps in that direction.

The timing is convenient, as current and former FDA officials are being hauled before Congress this week to answer questions about the shortage and the agency's role in worsening it. The hearings are likely to once again highlight how the FDA's internal dysfunction led to delays in informing the public about the problems at the Abbott Nutrition plant in Michigan, which was shut down in early 2022 due to contamination, spurring the shortages.

The fact that the FDA has admitted it played a major role in creating the baby formula shortage in the first place but has steadfastly refused to hold anyone at the administration accountable for those mistakes should temper any expectations of positive changes.

The FDA has also backpedaled since the start of the new year. On January 6, it rescinded some of the measures adopted last year to allow foreign formula producers to sell their products in the United States. Now, only applications from foreign producers who intend to have a permanent presence in the U.S. market are being reviewed—potentially cutting off suppliers who might be able to help on a temporary basis.

More than a year after the baby formula shortage hit, the federal government is still struggling to figure out what should be blindingly obvious. Want a more resilient market? Let more producers compete on a level playing field—regardless of whether their products are made here or not."

Striking the Right Balance on PFOA: Forever Chemicals

By Michael Dourson He has a PhD in toxicology from the University of Cincinnati, College of Medicine.

"The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is in the process of making a remarkable decision and one that will have repercussions throughout the US.  Its proposed safe levels in water for the “forever” chemicals perfluorooctanoate (PFOA) and its sulfonic acid (PFOS) are at extraordinary odds with other national authorities. 

These chemicals resemble fatty acids that we would normally be able to eat.  But since they are fluorinated, they are resistant to water and are long-lasting (we cannot digest them). As a result, they are very useful for many daily applications, like wrapping food to keep it from spoiling.

The EPA’s values are so much lower than others, 0.004 ppt (part per trillion –one sugar granule in 1 liter of water is 50,000 ppt), that small towns and cities throughout the US whose fire stations occasionally use fire-fighting foam containing such chemicals may be in jeopardy of lawsuits. Perhaps the EPA should reconsider since the World Health Organization (WHO) has dramatically different findings on PFOA and PFOS. 

WHO reviewed much of the same data as EPA but concluded that the scientific uncertainties were too large to estimate the safe level for PFOA or PFOS confidently. Instead, the WHO made a risk management judgment that a level in water of 100 parts per trillion for PFOA and 500 parts per trillion for all related chemistries would be appropriate. WHO’s judgment is slightly above EPA’s current water value of 70 ppt. However, as noted above, this is projected to go much lower and slightly below the Australian value of 560 ppt.  It would be hard to argue with the WHO that underlying scientific uncertainties preclude a definitive safe dose with such disparate values between these two government agencies.

Are the WHO’s PFAS limits for drinking water ‘weak’?

That is an argument made by a group of over 100 scientists and reported on by the Guardian. Perhaps some additional facts will help us understand this brouhaha better.

• The first fact, and one which the Guardian neglected or did not have room to mention, is that not only are “safe” water levels for PFOA and PFOS all over the map internationally (literally) but the EPA’s basis for its draft value, a single human observational study on a dubious effect, has again been rejected by the Food Standards of Australia and New Zealand (FSANZ, 2021).
• A second fact is that the letter was signed by over 100 individuals, with the preponderance being from academia. I do not doubt these scientists have done some outstanding bench work on PFAS chemistries, but with rare exceptions, academics are not known to be experts in determining the safe water levels of various chemistries.  In fact, on this list of signatories, I only know one with excellent risk assessment skills.   Of course, there may be others.
• A third fact, and one of which the Guardian author may have been unaware, was that two folks cited in his report are known to be expert witnesses for the plaintiff's bar, which was not acknowledged in the letter to the WHO nor the article.  Acknowledgments such as this are a routine part of science work in this era, and missing them seems odd.

Permit me a personal note.  I, too, was quoted in the article, but not all of my responses were mentioned.  I had the pleasure of working at EPA twice; I also spent some time as an academic and founded and still work at the non-profit, tax-exempt organization, Toxicology Excellence for Risk Assessment (TERA). The work of this non-profit is approximately a third on behalf of industry and two-thirds for government regulators. Our group has four recent publications on PFOA, all unfunded. One received a paper-of-the-year award from the Society of Toxicology, and two were written with an international team of scientists. We have also initiated a new international collaboration on developing a safe dose range for PFOA and PFOS."

FDA Finally Admits It Caused the Baby Formula Shortage

The agency is now taking small steps to allow foreign formula manufacturers to import their goods into the U.S.

By Eric Boehm of Reason.

"The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has finally determined what's to blame for America's recent shortage of baby formula.

The FDA.

More specifically, it's the FDA's unnecessary and protectionist rules that effectively ban foreign-made baby formula from being imported into the United States. On Wednesday, the agency announced plans to tweak those rules so foreign formula manufacturers can permanently import their goods into the U.S., giving American consumers greater choice in the marketplace and ensuring more robust supply chains.

"The need to diversify and strengthen the U.S. infant formula supply is more important than ever," FDA Commissioner Robert Califf said in a statement. "Ensuring that the youngest and most vulnerable individuals have access to safe and nutritious formula products is a top priority for the FDA."

That might be true now, but it clearly hasn't been the case in the past. As Reason has detailed throughout the recent crisis, the FDA's priorities have been protecting the domestic formula industry (and the dairy industry, which provides key inputs for baby formula) from foreign competition. As a result, it's nearly impossible to find foreign-made baby formula in the U.S., even though formula manufacturers based in England, the Netherlands, and Germany are some of the biggest suppliers of baby formula to the rest of the world.

When the Abbott Nutrition plant in Michigan was forced to close temporarily due to an FDA investigation into possible contamination, it created a supply shock that left store shelves empty and parents scrambling to find formula. Because of the FDA's protectionist rules (and high tariffs levied on foreign-made formula), markets could not adapt quickly to the shortage here in America—instead, we got political stunts like the White House's "Operation Fly Formula" that accomplished little.

In testimony to Congress, FDA officials admitted to botching the response to the contamination at the Abbott plant. But the real culprit of the recent shortage was a deeper and more pervasive one. No matter what nationalists like Sen. Josh Hawley (R–Mo.) might suggest, closing off the country to international trade is not a recipe for resilience. The baby formula crisis demonstrated that it is quite the opposite.

So it's good to see the FDA admit those mistakes and crack open the door to allowing foreign formula into the U.S. on a permanent basis.

Unfortunately, the list of policy changes the FDA announced on Wednesday mostly amounts to providing technical assistance to foreign firms that want to sell formula here. That is, offering help in navigating the complex approval process, rather than sweeping aside those regulations entirely. If a formula maker has passed muster under E.U. regulations, that should be good enough for the FDA.

There's also the matter of tariffs on imported formula, which are so high that they effectively make any imported formula uncompetitive in the American market. Why would a foreign manufacturer like Holle or HiPP go through the complicated FDA approval process (even after the announced changes) if it knows in advance that its goods won't be able to compete on a level playing field in America?

Give the FDA credit for identifying itself as one of the major causes of the baby formula shortage. But more changes are needed—including permanent changes to U.S. trade policy—to ensure a disaster like this can't happen again."

The Baby Formula Shortage Was Made in Washington

The politicians tacitly admit that their policies are responsible 

WSJ editorial.

"Politicians are scrambling to pacify mothers angry about the baby formula shortage, but the one thing they won’t do is look in the mirror. Fixing the shortage requires fixing the government policies that helped to create it.  

The shortage began after Abbott Laboratories shut down a plant in Michigan after four infants who consumed formula made at the facility fell seriously ill. Abbott controls about 42% of the U.S. market, and the other three large manufacturers (Perrigo, Nestle and Mead Johnson) haven’t been able to increase production fast enough to compensate. Ergo, empty shelves.

Enter President Biden, who on Wednesday invoked the Defense Production Act. The Cold War-era law lets the federal government conscript private businesses to produce goods for national defense and to reorder supply chains, putting some customers ahead of others. Progressives think government is the solution to every problem, which is why the law has become their household remedy to every product shortage.

Mr. Biden says the law will let his Administration prioritize raw ingredients for baby formula. He also plans to send government planes to fly in supply from overseas. But there doesn’t appear to be a shortage of formula ingredients. Nor is there a problem transporting it. The main barriers to increasing supply are regulatory. 

Trade protectionism—including tariffs of up to 17.5%—and Food and Drug Administration labeling and ingredient requirements limit competition. About 98% of U.S. infant formula is made domestically, though it’s no safer than European or Australian products. While FDA has the authority to inspect foreign plants, tariffs make imports less competitive.

Solution: Suspend tariffs and ease labeling and ingredient requirements for trusted partners. The FDA now says it will use enforcement discretion on product labeling and provide a streamlined import entry review process for products from foreign facilities with positive inspection records. But these trade barriers shouldn’t exist in the first place.

House Democrats passed a bill Wednesday that would give the FDA $28 million more to inspect foreign plants. OK, but the FDA’s problem isn’t too little money. It’s too much regulation.

A more helpful House bill would let the Secretary of Agriculture waive rules for the Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) program amid formula shortages. These rules limit new mothers to buying formula from the sole-source contractor in the states, which manage WIC.

Exclusive state contracts effectively give formula providers a monopoly. WIC makes up about half of the U.S. formula market, and Abbott and Mead Johnson have program contracts covering 87% of infants. Many supermarkets only stock shelves with the exclusive state-contractor, and doctors at hospitals are more likely to recommend them. Where are Lina Khan’s Federal Trade Commission trust busters when you really need them?

While the House legislation will help at the margin, broader reform is needed. But Democrats say they don’t have time for bigger fixes—it’s so much easier to round up the usual suspects. They’ve already begun investigating Abbott and other producers. “I think there might be a need for indictment,” Nancy Pelosi said this week. She means business executives, not Members of Congress, alas.

Meantime, Oregon Sen. Ron Wyden is blaming the shortage on—you can’t make this up—the 2017 GOP tax reform. What does one have to do with the other? The reform gives producers more capital to increase supply.

The formula shortage should ease as the Abbott plant comes back online and imports increase. But the lesson for America’s political class is that government policies that limit competition create supply-chain vulnerabilities that eventually bite consumers."

The inflexibility of American regulatory and trade policy might be the most important reason for the formula shortage

See The Baby Formula Crisis by David Leonhardt of The New York Times. Excerpt:

"Even as the industry seems to be under-regulated in some crucial ways, it may be overregulated in other, superficial ways.

This newsletter has covered ways that the F.D.A.’s bureaucratic inflexibility has hampered its Covid policy, and baby formula turns out to be another case study.

Many formulas sold in Europe exceed the F.D.A.’s nutritional standards, but they are banned from being sold here, often because of technicalities, like labeling, Derek Thompson of The Atlantic has noted. Donald Trump exacerbated the situation with a trade policy that made it harder to import formula from Canada. These policies benefit American formula makers, at the expense of families.

The inflexibility of American regulatory and trade policy, Thompson wrote, “might be the most important part of the story.”"

What Caused the Baby Formula Shortage?

Tariffs, government labeling rules and state welfare monopolies all play major roles.

WSJ editorial.

"By now you’ve heard that some 40% of the nation’s baby formula is out of stock, causing new mothers to hunt from store to store to feed their infants. This should never happen in America. How did it? Here’s the government part of the story you won’t hear from the political class.

Abbott Laboratories in February recalled several brands and shut down a plant in Michigan after complaints that four infants fell severely ill with a dangerous bacteria after ingesting its powdered formula. The Food and Drug Administration launched an investigation and onsite inspection, noting earlier findings that had detected the bacteria at the plant.

It’s not clear when the FDA was made aware of the problems at the plant and why it didn’t take action sooner. Abbott said this week that “after a thorough review of all available data, there is no evidence to link our formulas to these infant illnesses.” The FDA said Friday the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention closed its investigation after finding no more cases of infant illness.

Some conservatives blame the FDA for causing a scare, but the agency had no choice but to investigate the complaints and warn consumers. The real culprit is government policies that have limited formula options.

Last year Abbott accounted for 42% of the U.S. formula market, about 95% of which is produced domestically. There are only four major manufacturers of formula in the U.S. today: Mead Johnson, Abbott, Nestle, and Perrigo. One reason the market is so concentrated is tariffs up to 17.5% on imports, which protect domestic producers from foreign competition. Non-trade barriers such as FDA labeling and ingredient requirements also limit imports even during shortages.

Canada’s strong dairy industry has attracted investment in formula production. But the Trump Administration sought to protect domestic producers by imposing quotas and tariffs on Canadian imports in the USMCA trade deal. The FDA can inspect foreign plants so the U.S. import restrictions aren’t essential for product safety. They merely raise prices for consumers and limit choice.

Further limiting competition is the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) for low-income mothers. By the Department of Agriculture’s estimate, WIC accounted for between 57% and 68% of all infant formula sold in the U.S. Under the welfare program, each state awards an exclusive formula contract to a manufacturer.

Companies compete for the contracts by offering states huge rebates on the formula women can buy. The rebates equal about 85% of the wholesale cost, according to a 2011 USDA study. Women can only use WIC vouchers to purchase formula from the winning manufacturer. These rebates reduce state spending, but there’s no such thing as free baby formula.

Why would manufacturers give states an enormous discount? Because the contracts effectively give them a state monopoly. Stores give WIC brands more shelf space. Physicians may also be more likely to recommend WIC brands. After 30 states switched their WIC contracts between 2005 and 2008, the new provider’s market share increased on average by 84 percentage points.

***

America’s baby-formula shortage illustrates how bigger government can make big business bigger, thereby limiting competition and choice. This is especially worth noting as Democrats push to expand entitlements and government control over the private economy with Medicare for All, free child care, universal pre-K and more.

It also illustrates that global trade has its uses, and there are costs to the faddish drive to produce everything in America. Members of both parties in Congress want to subsidize domestic production, but this can create its own supply-chain vulnerabilities. Globalization nowadays may be a dirty word, but having diverse suppliers is an economic strength."

Horrible FDA Regulation of Infant Formula

By David Henderson.

"I thought I had known the major government contributors to the baby formula crisis. But the following 3 paragraphs tell some things that are new to me:

Regulation is a major reason only four large formula producers control most of the U.S. market. First, parents receiving WIC assistance are allowed to choose only certain brands. Second, consumers must pay a 17.5 percent tariff on any imported formula, which prices countless brands out of the U.S. market. It’s a nice arrangement for the companies — and for their lobbyists — but it raises prices for families and makes it difficult to boost supplies during shortages.

When new formulas enter the market, regulations forbid sellers from letting anyone know about them for 90 days, even as manufacturers may advertise existing formulas all they like. Those first months on the shelf are make-or-break for many new products, which is why existing producers like this otherwise pointless regulation. At times like this, parents might appreciate hearing about new options.

One of those options is toddler formula, which in many cases meets the Food and Drug Administration’s nutritional requirements for infant formula. However, FDA regulations prohibit many manufacturers from recommending this option.

This is from Ryan Young, “Cronyism Makes the Baby Formula Shortage Worse,” AIER, May 24, 2022.

The 90-day restriction is outrageous.

Read the whole thing."

How the U.S. got into this baby formula mess

By Scott Horsley of NPR. Excerpt:

"The federal government not only regulates formula makers. It's also their biggest customer. About half of all formula sold in the U.S. is paid for by the Department of Agriculture, through its Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants and Children (WIC).

Each state signs an exclusive contract with one of the formula manufacturers to supply subsidized product for low-income families. The government gets a big price break. In exchange, the formula maker gets a large, captive market.

The USDA's own research found that whichever company gets the WIC contract in a state enjoys a powerful market advantage there, with a monopoly over WIC sales and "spillover" effects in the non-WIC market as well.

Supermarkets tend to give preferential shelf space to the formula maker with the WIC contract. And pediatricians may be more likely to recommend that brand to their patients.

"Because the WIC program is such a large purchaser — it buys about half the formula on the market — once a company has an exclusive deal to service a state, competitors don't have a financial incentive to compete in that state," Kelloway says.

Abbott — the company behind the shuttered Michigan plant — has the WIC monopoly in about two-thirds of all states. The administration has asked states to relax those rules temporarily, so WIC recipients can use their benefits to buy any brand of formula.

Typically, the U.S. buys almost no infant formula from other countries. There are steep, 17.5% tariffs on most formula that is brought in. And regulatory barriers make it almost impossible for formula makers outside the country to sell to the customers in the United States.

"It's clear that the U.S. has basically closed off its market to imports," says Mary Lovely, a senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics.

Regulations governing the manufacture and labeling of formula are ostensibly designed to protect the safety of U.S. infants. But they also serve to protect the domestic formula companies from overseas competition.

"There's really no reason we should be blocking perfectly nutritional formula coming out of high-quality, sanitary plants in the European Union," Lovely says. "There is no reason why we can't be importing baby formula from Canadian plants, which could very easily be inspected by FDA."

To address the current formula shortage, the FDA has relaxed its rules to allow for imported formula — a tacit admission that foreign supplies can be sold safely, with adequate precautions.

Lovely says the formula shortage illustrates the pitfalls of believing that an entirely domestic supply chain is necessarily more secure.

"Having one or two factories in the U.S. or suppliers in the U.S. is not a way to be resilient," she says. "In fact, it's a recipe for being vulnerable."

Security comes from having a variety of suppliers — at home and in friendly foreign countries. In other words, don't put all your eggs in one basket, or all your baby formula in one bottle."

How Government Created the Baby Formula Shortage—and a Black Market for 'Unapproved' European Imports

As Christina Szalinski reported in the New York Times, “baby formula is one of the most tightly regulated food products in the US." 

By Jon Miltimore of FEE.

"As many know, the US is confronting a shortage in baby formula that has grown quite serious. What started as complaints on Twitter of “out of stock” messages on Amazon purchases has turned into a national panic.

CBS News reports that at retailers across the country, some 40 percent of the top-selling baby formula products were out of stock as of late April, according to an analysis from Datasembly.

"This is a shocking number that you don't see for other categories," Ben Reich, CEO of Datasembly, told the news network.

The story got enough traction to finally get the attention of the White House.

On Monday, Press Secretary Jen Psaki said the government is doing its best to address the shortage, noting that manufacturers say they’re producing at full capacity following a product recall by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA).

“Ensuring the availability is also a priority for the FDA and they’re working around the clock to address any possible shortage,” Psaki said.

Psaki is not wrong that the product recall has made the baby formula shortage worse.

As Eric Boehm pointed out at Reason, part of the shortage stems from a suspected bacterial outbreak at an Abbott plant in Michigan, which prompted the recall of three major brands of powdered formula. Matters were made worse when the plant was subsequently shut down for FDA inspection.

Still, one could be reasonably suspicious of the idea that a single contamination could upend the entire US baby formula market. And for good reason.

A closer look at US trade and regulatory policies reveals the government itself is primarily responsible for the baby formula shortage.

‘One of the Most Tightly Regulated Food Products’

Few may realize it, but baby formula is one of the most regulated food products in America. That’s not me saying it, but the New York Times.

As Christina Szalinski reported in March 2021, “baby formula is one of the most tightly regulated food products in the US, with the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) dictating the nutrients and vitamins, and setting strict rules about how formula is produced, packaged, and labeled.”

Despite these regulations—more likely, because of them—many American parents buy "unapproved" European formula even though, Szalinski notes, it’s technically against the law.

“There are large Facebook groups devoted to European formulas, where parents share spreadsheets and detailed notes on ingredients and how these formulas compare to their US counterparts,” she notes. “Some caregivers report choosing them because European brands offer certain formula options (like those made from goat’s milk or milk from pasture-raised cows), which are rare or nonexistent in an FDA-regulated form in the US. Others seek out European brands because of the perception that the formulas are of higher quality and that European formula regulations are stricter.”

On this black(ish) market, it turns out Americans are willing to pay big bucks for European formula. Szalinski says that on one website selling EU baby formula, you’ll find German imports that run roughly $26 for a 400-gram box, which is about quadruple the price of the top US baby formulas recommended by the Times.

At times, these nefarious black market imports have resulted in high profile busts, like in April 2021 when US Customs and Border Protection agents in Philadelphia seized 588 cases of baby formula (value: $30,000) that violated the FDA’s “import safety regulations.”

Some may contend that the FDA is simply keeping Americans and their babies safe—which is no doubt what regulators want you to believe—but this overlooks an inconvenient fact: despite the FDA’s efforts, Americans are consuming vast amounts of black market baby formula, and the children are doing just fine.

The government’s regulatory war on baby formula imports isn’t the only way it has contributed to the baby formula shortage, however. Tariffs have also played a role. As Cato scholar Scott Lincicome pointed out on Twitter, the US government imposes a stiff levy on baby formula (technically a “tariff rate quota”) that amounts to 18 percent.

There’s general agreement among economists that tariffs create market distortions that harm domestic consumers over time, and there’s every reason to believe these taxes on imports have made it more difficult for Americans to access baby formula during this shortage (and hit their pocketbooks, too).

Who Gets to Choose

If the Biden administration is serious about addressing the baby formula, they’d forget about “working around the clock” and simply abolish the protectionist policies and regulations that are making it more difficult to purchase formula.

Some may contend that this would result in more foreign imports of baby formula of “questionable” quality, but it’s a mistake to believe that bureaucrats in Washington, DC (or anywhere else for that matter) have the “proper” formula that meets some universal standard.

Indeed, as Szalinski points out in her Times article, though the EU and the US both require a bunch of the same vitamins and minerals in baby formula, there are some striking differences as well, particularly in iron content and DHA (an omega-3 fatty acid).

Because the EU requires high levels of DHA, something that isn’t required at all in the US, nearly all American baby formulas fail to meet the EU standard.

“Currently, the only US formula that would meet the EU’s requirements for DHA is the new infant formula Bobbie,” writes Szalinski. “As a self-described ‘European-style’ formula, Bobbie is marketed as an FDA-regulated alternative to European formulas.”

Bureaucrats in DC no doubt will tell you their formula is the correct and healthy one, while bureaucrats in the EU almost certainly would contend they have the right mixture of ingredients.

This invites an important question: who actually has the best baby formula for infants, the EU or the US?

Many may think they know, but the economist Thomas Sowell reminds us this is the wrong question.

“The most basic question is not what is best, but who shall decide what is best,” Sowell says.

What Sowell was getting at is that consumers with skin in the game must ultimately decide what product or service is best for them, and government attempts to regulate that choice invariably make it more difficult for consumers to get the best product at the best price.

This is why the economist Ludwig von Mises noted that consumers—not politicians, CEOs, or bureaucrats—are the true captains of the economic ship in a free market.

“The real bosses, in the capitalist system of market economy, are the consumers,” Mises wrote in his book Bureaucracy. “They, by their buying and by their abstention from buying, decide who should own the capital and run the plants. They determine what should be produced and in what quantity and quality. Their attitudes result either in profit or in loss for the enterpriser.”

The baby formula shortage is the latest example that shows most people in Washington, DC need to crack open some Mises and stop trying to provide “solutions” to markets."

Deregulate Home Food Businesses

By Chris Edwards of Cato.

"The pandemic has created lasting changes to the economy. More employees are working from home, videocalls are replacing business travel, and home‐​based entrepreneurship is booming. The internet is a key driver of home entrepreneurship—the number of arts‐​and‐​crafts businesses on Etsy​.com, for example, jumped from 2.6 million in 2019 to 7.5 million by 2021.

Another thriving area of internet‐​driven entrepreneurship is home‐​based food production for retail sale, often called the cottage food industry. Popular cottage foods include baked goods, canned goods, pickled goods, chocolates, candies, jams, fruit pies, honey, and pasta.

Home‐​based food businesses offer entrepreneurs cost savings and lifestyle advantages. Aspiring entrepreneurs may not be able to pursue their dreams if they have to rent commercial kitchen space and pay for childcare and commuting. Homes are a low‐​cost incubator to test business ideas before making larger investments. The vast majority of commercial craft brewers, for example, got their start brewing at home.

However, cottage food industry growth faces a major barrier: government health and zoning rules that ban, restrict, or raise costs for home‐​based businesses, as I discuss here. State and local rules vary widely regarding food items that can be sold, where they can be sold, and the sales volume allowed. At one end of the freedom spectrum, Wyoming home businesses can sell any type of food except meat within an annual sales limit of $250,000. At the other end of the spectrum, Rhode Island only allows farmers to sell food made in their homes, and even sales from farmers are tightly restricted.

The New York Times on Monday profiled the rise in internet sales of food produced by small businesses, including home businesses. The article captures the tension between restrictive regulations and the desire of individuals to earn a living from their passion for food.

Several days a week, Juliet Achan moves around the kitchen of her apartment in Greenpoint, Brooklyn, stirring up dishes from her Surinamese background: fragrant batches of goat curry, root vegetable soup and her own take on chicken chow mein.

She packages the meals, and they are picked up for delivery to customers who order through an app called WoodSpoon. “Joining WoodSpoon has made a huge difference during the pandemic, giving me the flexibility to work safely from home and supplement my income,” Ms. Achan said in a news release from the company in February.

However, in the state of New York, there are no permits or licenses that allow individuals to sell hot meals cooked in their home kitchens. And WoodSpoon, a three‐​year‐​old start‐​up that says it has about 300 chefs preparing foods on its platform and has raised millions of dollars from investors, including the parent company of Burger King, knows it.

… start‐​ups like WoodSpoon and Shef have emerged, pushing what has been an underground industry of selling food to friends and family into the mainstream through apps.

… The companies paint themselves as part of the new gig economy, a way for the people making the food to earn a little or a lot of money, working whatever days and hours best fit their schedules. Selling meals online presents an opportunity for women who have struggled to work outside the home because of limited child care options or for refugees and recent immigrants, said Alvin Salehi, a senior technology adviser during the Obama administration and one of the founders of Shef.

… From her kitchen in the Lower East Side of Manhattan, María Bído uses WoodSpoon to sell classic Puerto Rican dishes like mofongo, bacalaitos and sancocho, using recipes she learned from her grandmother. “My whole life, people told me, ‘You need to do something with your food,’ but I always shut myself down without even trying,” Ms. Bído said. “How are you going to do that? How is it going to happen? How is it going to work out? “Now I have weekly income. I can see my earnings. And I’m getting reviews.” She believes this will help toward her next goal of moving to a commercial kitchen and offering her specialties across the country.

Some people may think that tight restrictions make sense for safety reasons. One problem with that position is that if laws are too strict, cottage food goes underground. Atlanta magazine examined Georgia’s cottage food laws. Before reforms, producers “were prohibited, under most circumstances, from selling any type of food that was not prepared in a commercial‐​grade kitchen used solely for commercial purposes.” So “if you wanted to sell birthday cakes out of your home, you had to build a second kitchen used only for that purpose.” The result was “a lot of home cooks selling baked goods under the table, without licensing or food safety training.” With reforms in Georgia, home entrepreneurs can now sell many foodstuffs, including “breads, cakes, cookies, fruit pies, jams and jellies, dried fruits, herbs and mixtures, cereals and granola, nuts, vinegars, popcorn and candies.”

Another problem with overly restrictive rules is that they strangle nascent entrepreneurship and undermine the economy. Harvard Law School’s Food Law and Policy Clinic profiled Mark Stambler, who was shut down by Los Angeles County for selling bread made in his home. Stambler fought back and was successful in getting local cottage food laws liberalized. His business grew, he won baking awards, and he ultimately founded a successful brick‐​and‐​mortar business. The Harvard researchers noted that because “Mark was able to start his business out of his home kitchen, he was able to test the market for his product and take a risk that ultimately led to a very successful business.”

I don’t know what level of cottage food regulation is ideal. I do know that markets generally work better than regulations, and that when regulations are too tight, activities go underground to nobody’s benefit. Cottage food laws vary widely by state, and so an obvious way forward is for the most restrictive states to consider reforms to match the freest states. Rhode Island, which shuts down moms for selling home‐​baked cookies, could learn from Wyoming, which “is a model for the food freedom approach.”

People want to produce food at home to earn income, to test business ideas, and to benefit their communities. Other people want to buy the products, and a general rule of markets is that voluntary exchanges are mutually beneficial. So rather than knee‐​jerk banning home food production, governments should work to facilitate the growing industry and expand opportunities for food entrepreneurs."

Organic food isn’t better for us – or the environment

By Matt Ridley.

"It is mystifying to me that organic food is still widely seen as healthier, more sustainable and, most absurdly, safer than non-organic food.

Following the publication of part two of Henry Dimbleby’s National Food Strategy last week, the organic movement was quick to suggest that organic food and farming offer a way to achieve the strategy’s vision. ‘The recommendations of the National Food Strategy offer genuine hope that by embracing agroecological and organic farming, and adopting a healthier and more sustainable diet, we can address the climate, nature and health crises,’ said Helen Browning, chief executive of the Soil Association, Britain’s most vocal organic lobbying organisation. Browning also highlighted the strategy’s recognition of the Soil Association’s ‘Food for Life’ programme — essentially a vehicle to promote greater procurement and use of organic food in schools and hospitals.

The trouble is that scientific evidence indicates that the food safety risks of eating organic food are considerably greater than those of eating non-organic food. This is primarily because organic crop production relies on animal faeces as a fertiliser, an obvious vector for potentially lethal pathogens such as E.coli, but also because organic crops can be prone to harmful mycotoxins as a result of inadequate control of crop pests and diseases.

In his 2019 book The Myths About Nutrition Science, food and nutrition adviser David Lightsey cites an analysis of US Food and Drug Administration food safety recall data by Academics Review — a group of scientists dedicated to challenging anti-science claims — which showed that ‘organic foods are four to eight times more likely to be recalled than conventional foods for safety issues like bacterial contamination’.

Sadly the recall system is not always 100 per cent effective in protecting human health. In 2011, a major food poisoning outbreak in Europe which affected nearly 4,000 people, killing 53, was ultimately traced to organically grown bean sprouts from a farm in Germany that had been contaminated by a virulent E.coli strain, O104:H4.

Browning’s own organic meat company is currently at the centre of a listeria outbreak, with its organic corned beef being recalled just as Browning is publicly championing organic food as a healthier, more sustainable option. The Food Standards Agency notes that symptoms caused by listeria monocytogenes can be similar to flu and include high temperature, muscle ache or pain, chills, feeling or being sick, and diarrhoea. In rare cases, infections can be more severe, causing serious complications such as meningitis.

On the issue of sustainability, there are serious questions about whether a scaling-up of organic agriculture — Browning has called for Britain to exceed the EU’s Farm to Fork target of 25 per cent organic agriculture — would genuinely deliver environmental benefits.

Independent research published in Nature has shown that if England and Wales switched 100 per cent to organic it would actually increase the greenhouse gas emissions associated with our food supply because of the greater need for imports. Scaling up organic agriculture might also put at risk the movement’s core values in terms of promoting local, fresh produce and small family farms.

Browning was at the centre of reports earlier this year that her firm Helen Browning’s Organic had switched to procurement of organic pork from Denmark, sent to its processing factory in Germany before onward dispatch to UK supermarkets. To me, that sounds more like an industrial, multinational food business than ‘supporting British farmers’ as the company’s website claims.

To his credit, Dimbleby does not appear to have entirely fallen for the organic lobby’s rhetoric. His creative vision of a three compartment model for land use — allowing room for a combination of natural habitat, low-intensity farming and high-yield, hi-tech farming — follows the science and, if properly implemented, could deliver a more sustainable balance in terms of food production, resource use and environmental impact.

The strategy also notes that many households would not be able to afford to feed themselves at organic prices, with the premium for organic produce ranging from 11 per cent (for organic milk) to more than 400 per cent (for organic chicken).

Quite rightly, Dimbleby recognises that sustainably produced food in the future must look to innovation and new technologies — robots, drones, improved genetics and AI — to produce carbon-neutral and non-polluting food crops. And I remain hopeful as we chart our recovery from the Covid pandemic (a recovery made possible by the modern genetic technologies shunned and campaigned against by the organic lobby) that a more evidence-based approach to building a better food future will prevail.

Surveying the problems of traditional farming in his native India, a friend of mine, Professor Channa Prakash, once remarked: ‘Sure, organic agriculture is sustainable: it sustains poverty and malnutrition.’

I believe in freedom of choice, and I will defend an individual’s right to choose organic, but when it comes to protecting the health of the youngest and most vulnerable members of society — in our schools and hospitals — the demonstrable health risks of organic food outweigh any perceived sustainability benefits."

To Stanch COVID-19 Meat Crisis, Let Small Farmers Sell Meat to Local Grocers

The ability of Americans to buy meat in grocery stores is at risk due to serious supply-chain issues caused by COVID-19

By Baylen Linnekin and Tyler Lindholm of Reason.

"The ability of Americans to buy meat in grocery stores is at risk due to serious supply-chain issues caused by COVID-19. Though President Donald Trump just issued an executive order last week requiring meat plants to remain open, there are likely too many sick plant workers for the order to prop up the nation's dwindling meat supply.

The nation's small farmers and ranchers stand ready to help address these supply shortages. But unless Congress moves quickly to amend, suspend, or repeal a burdensome and ineffective federal law, red tape will prevent that meat from ever reaching grocers—or you.

Last month, Smithfield, the nation's largest pork processor, announced it was closing its Sioux Falls, South Dakota, plant "indefinitely" due to a massive outbreak of coronavirus among its thousands of plant workers there. That facility had been processing 4 to 5 percent of the pork Americans consume every day. Since then, competitors in several states have also been forced to shutter or reduce output at facilities in several states.

These massive plants, where livestock are slaughtered and broken down into commercial portions, were created to maximize worker output and efficiency. They were not designed with COVID-19 distancing guidelines in mind. Plant employees often work "shoulder-to-shoulder" and at breakneck speeds—processing more than 1,000 pig carcasses an hour, for example.

Even as large meat processors face peril, many small, local farmers and ranchers—including those who raise high-quality, grassfed cattle—report brisk business in direct-to-consumer (on-farm) sales. While those farmers and ranchers would be happy to sell meat to grocery stores—allowing grocers to keep shelves stocked—a decades-old federal law stands in the way.

That law, the Wholesome Meat Act, which Congress passed in 1967, requires all commercially available beef and pork to be slaughtered and processed either in USDA-inspected facilities or in state facilities that enforce processes "equal to" federal rules. The law, which was intended to boost cooperation between the USDA and state governments, applies both to interstate and intrastate sales. Practically, that means a local rancher who wants to sell 100 pounds of ground beef to a local food co-op must follow the same rules as a giant producer that slaughters tens of thousands of hogs or head of cattle each day and then ships their meat to states across the country. It also means that local rancher who wants to sell meat through commercial channels often must bear the expense of sending her livestock hundreds of miles away—even out of state—to be slaughtered.

With regulatory and cost burdens so high, many farmers and ranchers instead choose to utilize much smaller, local "custom" slaughter facilities and abattoirs outside the USDA inspection regime. Those that do so may only sell an interest in a live animal, which forecloses on the option to sell much smaller portions—such as steaks—to grocers and others.

The Wholesome Meat Act and the 1906 law it amended—the Federal Meat Inspection Act—have been blamed for food-safety issues and massive consolidation in the industry, with Smithfield, Cargill, JBS, and Tyson now controlling most of the nation's meat supply; large producers have cornered more than 80 percent of the nation's beef market and more than 70 percent of the pork market.

That enormous meat supply is now at risk. But a fix is at hand—if Washington acts fast.

As we see it, this is one problem—that meat processed in custom slaughterhouses cannot be sold in intrastate commerce—with three distinct solutions. First, Congress could move immediately to suspend, amend, or repeal portions of the Wholesome Meat Act to allow intrastate commercial sales of meat processed in custom slaughter facilities and abattoirs according to the laws of each respective state. Second, Congress could finally pass the PRIME Act, a bipartisan bill that would have a similar impact. Third, the USDA may be able to suspend enforcement temporarily of the Wholesome Meat Act's provisions pertaining to the mandatory inspection of intrastate meat processing and sales. Other agencies have suspended enforcing rules due to COVID-19. For example, in March, the EPA announced it would suspend enforcement of some pollution regulations due to the pandemic. (Suspending enforcement of rules doesn't require a pandemic. Years earlier, the Obama administration also suspended enforcement of selective rules.)

Choosing any of these three approaches would allow that local rancher to sell her ranch's ground beef to her local grocer, co-op, or restaurant, along with supplying meat at farmers markets, via online sales, and through other commercial avenues. On the other hand, choosing to maintain the status quo will harm consumers, smaller ranchers, and grocers while further decimating the nation's meat supply.

The choice is clear. The integrity of our food supply demands quick action."