USDA Schedules Public Hearings

The “Leafy Green Marketing Agreement,” which requires producers to follow a set of rules (metrics) in the name of food safety, has already shown to be injurious for the environment, biodiversity, and organic growers in California, according to the Cornucopia Institute. The USDA is now considering a similar “Leafy Green Marketing Agreement” that would extend beyond California and Arizona to cover the entire USA. The USDA has scheduled a series of hearing sessions around the USA, inviting people to share concerns and suggestions. The Cornucopia Institute calls for people to attend and speak on behalf of the organic and family-scale farming community.
 

Producers’ experiences in California, where these metrics have been in place for several years, reveal what is at stake. While food safety is a legitimate national concern, organic and small-scale farmers bear a disproportionate economic burden of these metrics. The environmental impacts of the Leafy Green metrics have also been alarming. Since wildlife, non-crop vegetation (wild habitat), and water bodies could be viewed as food safety risks, many environmentally positive, conservation and habitat-oriented practices that growers have implemented in California have been forced to be destroyed or abandoned by growers threatened with the rejection of their crops. If these metrics are adopted nationally, the Cornucopia Institute reports, organic farmers across the nation could face difficulties.

The Cornucopia Institute