Cheap food just keeps getting cheaper and cheaper and cheaper.
Oh, how low can it go??
If you’ve been buying conventional chicken and ordering it in restaurants thinking it is so much healthier than red meat (what a joke), try this info on for size.
Yet another round of bad news for conventional chicken is on the horizon hot on the heels of a recent lawsuit filed on behalf of the Center for Food Safety, the Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy (IATP) and several other environmental groups to force the FDA to respond to a three year old petition calling for immediate withdrawal of the FDA’s approval of arsenic-containing compounds as feed additives for chickens (yes, arsenic is STILL in your chicken).
“FDA leadership is asleep at the switch, if not turning a blind eye to public health,” said David Wallinga, MD, a physician with the IATP.
In typical stealth-mode fashion just before the Labor Day holiday, the USDA joined the FDA in its wallowing in the mud chicken policy by quietly green lighting 4 chicken processing plants in China effectively lifting the ban on Chinese processed poultry. The chickens must be raised in either the US, Canada, or Chile (of all places) but after slaughter the chickens can be shipped all the way to China for processing. The processed poultry can then be exported by China back to the US for consumers to unwittingly buy sans any labeling of country of origin (of course).
How’s this for warped logic? The USDA says that country of origin labeling is not necessary because no matter what is done to the chickens during processing in China, the chicken meat itself originated in the US.
What would you expect from the USDuh USDA? After all, China is the world headquarters for food safety scandals with the most recent incident involving an outbreak of H7N9 bird flu virus in fresh meat markets.
The truth is that food safety standards in China are far below US standards and you may (or may not) be surprised to learn that USDA inspectors aren’t even required to be on site at these Chinese processing plants to make sure things stay on the up and up.
The scariest part of all of this to me is how it drives home the point of how globalized the industrial food system has truly become. Containerized shipping to the other side of the world on freighters which pollute and destroy our precious oceans (there is a vortex of garbage the size of Texas swirling in the middle of the Pacific Ocean primarily caused by these freighters) has now become so cheap that it makes more sense for companies to create a chicken nugget in China from chicken meat raised and slaughtered on the other side of the world to be ultimately sold on the other side of the world again in a Happy Meal to a US child than to do it all in roughly one place.
Buying local as a critical element to sourcing quality, nutritious food and voting green with your food dollars have never been more important than it is now!
Sarah, The Healthy Home Economist
Sources:
FDA ignores toxic arsenic in animal feed
Playing Chicken: Avoiding Arsenic in Your Meat
Officials say “okay” to processed chicken from China
Food Safety in China and the Risk to the US
USDA: Chicken Processed in China Can be Sold in the US Without Labels to Say So
Kate
Wow. What a shame (or sham)! I just sent an email to Coleman Natural foods to see about arsenic and processing origin. We are blessed to have a provider of free range chicken, but we supplement with Coleman on occasion as needed. That may be changing!
Andi
This is disgraceful!! I always buy organic chicken, but I don’t have a good local source for chicken.(yet) Anyone know if TJ’s sources from reasonable farmers?
Jan
I don’t know about TJ’s, but you can check the interactive map at http://www.eatwild.com/products/index.html for farmers near you.
Jean | DelightfulRepast.com
“Buying local and/or organic has now become a matter of conscience. It has gone far beyond a health issue at this point. The industrialized food system is destroying the planet all in the name of profits and efficiency. I for one would rather eat dirt than support it with one red cent of my food budget.” Sarah, that is EXACTLY what I was going to say!
I am reminded of the old saying: The only problem with common sense is that it isn’t very common!
Susan
When I was telling my friend about this, she brushed it off with, “I’ll just buy organic.” I tried to explain to her that there are large chicken producers who feed their chickens organic feed, so they can sell them as organic, yet they weren’t raised in a manner that any of us real foodies would agree with. So, how do we know this “organic” chicken won’t be shipped off to China, as well, to be processed?
The big box store that starts with a C sells organic eggs (in CA) from a company I find really questionable. They seem to have been the main egg provider to this store for years, so it made me chuckle while shopping in there once and seeing this company was now offering organic eggs. If people watched videos taken undercover from this producer, you wouldn’t care that they are “organic.” This place is so disgusting that it annoys the crap out of me that they get to sell “organic” eggs that people have no clue about; they simply buy them because the eggs are organic.
These big corporations are figuring out how to get around the increased desire for all things organic by continuing to fool us all. I’m concerned the “organic” chicken meat we get lured into buying because not all of us have access to pastured chickens, will get shipped off to China and we won’t have a clue. Just like the egg scenario.
Note to self: Find someone local who sells meat chickens….STAT!
Laura Hayes
It’s not just chicken. Many of our vaccines are now made in China. And if you think/know the FDA does a horrible job of regulating vaccine quality control here in the U.S., it’s even worse in China. According to neurosurgeon, Dr. Russell Blaylock, FDA inspectors are only allowed to inspect Chinese vaccine manufacturing plants once every 13 years…from the outside! That’s right, U.S. FDA inspectors are not allowed inside the plants! To hear that portion of Dr. Blaylock’s presentation, begin listening at 20:12: http://vaccineliberationarmy.com/2013/09/02/dr-russell-blaylock-neurosurgeon-how-vaccines-harm-child-brains/
If you are interested to know how vaccines given to pregnant women affect the fetus (now that vaccinating pregnant women is unbelievably and tragically standard practice here in the U.S.!), begin listening at 10:20. The entire presentation is worth listening to for those who would like to learn more about the dangers and inefficacies of vaccines.
I know my comment is a bit off topic from the chicken topic, but it’s all related in the sense that our governmental regulatory agencies are NOT doing their jobs. The FDA and CDC are jokes, whose regulators are in the back pockets of big business. They are all about their wealth, not our health. Their ineptness (or shall we call it what it is, their corruption) crosses all domains, from food, to vaccines, to prescription drugs, etc. Americans, sadly, need to be wary of any information, advice, and/or recommendations that come from either one of these agencies. Ironic, isn’t it, since we pay their salaries via our hard-earned tax dollars.
Kenny F
This is bad in every imaginable way other than for the capitalists profiting from it.
Confinement livestock is a breeding ground for disease, but rather than focus on the awfulness of the factory system, let’s focus on Economics and Environment.
The people in the US who process chickens are generally migrant workers/illegals who are paid minimum wage or below. For the sake of this conversation, let’s just assume they’re making the federal minimum wage of $7.25/hour.
Now consider the cost of fuel, round trip to china — including from the airport to the processing plant. I don’t know the exact number, but fuel isn’t cheap. To be profitable, the cost of fuel shipping dead chickens to and from China + the cost of Chinese labor would have to be quite a bit LESS THAN the $7.25 they’d be paying workers here.
So you have Chinese workers getting paid — let’s face it — slave wages to process your chicken, as quickly as possible, without supervision from the USDA. Factory-raised chicken processed in the US already has a 39% chance of carrying Salmonella. Do you think that number would go down or up in China with little supervision and slave wages? Hmmmm….
But wait…there’s more…think about all of the money being taken out of the US economy by this outsourcing? Workers here lose their jobs — they don’t have money to spend and they don’t get a paycheck to pay taxes. Further, the rest of us are paying into their medicaid/unemployment safety net. More money comes out of the pockets of the middle class and straight up to the top.
I’m not a person who begrudges people who live in poverty — I begrudge people who profit on the backs of the taxpayer by sending jobs overseas and/or under-paying workers. (this is why I hate WalMart, btw).
The environmental impact/carbon footprint is abhorrent beyond belief as well. Companies who profit at the expense of the environment should pay heavy fines and penalties. Okay, roasted and tortured in hell. Whichever works better.
Lastly, this chicken will not require any additional labeling. You won’t know WHERE in the world it came from. “no country-of-origin labels are required under the new rules.”
VOTE WITH YOUR DOLLARS. It’s the loudest (and only) voice you have anymore.Stop supporting this toxic system.
Sarah, The Healthy Home Economist
Buying local and/or organic has now become a matter of conscience. It has gone far beyond a health issue at this point. The industrialized food system is destroying the planet all in the name of profits and efficiency. I for one would rather eat dirt than support it with one red cent of my food budget.
Elle
Can someone explain “why” this has happened? I don’t believe we are really benefiting money-wise (in this country) if we are shipping food back and forth, back and forth – how can we make more money that way than just by sourcing out at home. $ is the only reason for these atrocities but I don’t see how it is benefiting us. Are we doing it to keep relations with China (and other countries) at our own expense? I don’t get it. It’s just like factory farming – I don’t REALLY think the farmers are making MORE $ than local farming. There must be something I just don’t get????? Anyone have insight?
Megan
The proof is in the pudding. Make a note of what supermkt conventional chicken sells for right now. Then wait and see if the china chicken makes the prices go down. I bet you prices will not drop. That tells you right there that it ain’t about lowering prices, it’s about more profit into the big pockets. It wouldn’t hurt to keep an eye on the statistics of foodborne illnesses either because THAT will certainly rise.
John
Want a real shocker subscribe to FDA recalls. http://www.fda.gov/safety/recalls/ I did so and am astounded at the ineffective containment in processed foods and drugs. Most of the recalls are done by the producers and self policed I seriously doubt Chinese producers will police themselves.
JusticeToAll
Wow…I am speechless. This has to be stopped, it has to be repealed and nothing like it ever passed! China? CHINA?! What the hell are the USDA and FDA thinking? I really do think there are evil forces at work behind the scenes when stuff like this happens. Agenda 21 anyone?
Beth
Basically, the globalized industrial food system = insane troll logic. This is very disturbing.
Cindy
I was thinking about how crazy this method of production was just the other day. A few years ago in our newspaper was a story about one of the richest business women in the world from China. She made her fortune buying paper waste from the west coast, (including my city) processing it, and turning it into stationary. More than likely sold back to us. I wonder how beneficial it would be to keep our own paper/food/metal scrap here instead of selling off these resources only to buy them back again. It feels like a snake eating it’s own tail method of business!
When you say it to yourself it sounds completely ridiculous. I expect a lot more food recalls in the future. My husband told me that some car parts made in China have a 9/10 failure rate. They are shipped over here and the 90% that don’t pass the grade are shipped back and melted down again. Despite that huge failure rate it’s still cheaper to make that 10% overseas than to have them produced in North America. Cheaper is always better though isn’t it.