Source:  Rita Jane Gabbett, MEATINGPLACE.COM, 3/26/10

The National Meat Association is busy in Washington trying to facilitate export and immigration policies that could help the meat industry head off legislation and USDA rules that could hurt it.

Meatingplace recently sat down with NMA Executive Director and CEO Barry Carpenter to find out more about the association's efforts.

What is the No. 1 issue you are working on in Washington?

Where FSIS may be going with some of its guidelines and new efforts to control microorganisms. Specifically, how they are going to address the non-O157 STECs and how they are going to address salmonella.

What is it you are hoping USDA will do?

I'm hoping they will do a baseline study with effective testing mechanisms to make sure they have good data. And part of that risk assessment is assessing the true risk of other pathogens in the meat system before they make any decisions.

Do you think USDA should create stronger regulations around non-O157 STECs?

I don't know because I haven't done the research, and I don't believe it has been effectively done. There needs to be good, sound risk assessment that is peer reviewed to make decisions to focus both the industry's and the government's resources in the right places.

What legislation is currently on Capitol Hill that you are most concerned with and involved in?

We are most concerned about the legislation dealing with FDA. Not because we have products regulated by FDA, but we don't want to have a situation where there are some systems put in place there that we know will not be workable to the meat industry. We are working on things like the recall provisions, indemnification related to recalls and performance standards, all of which could potentially have an impact on the Meat and Poultry Inspection Act.

Is the concern that changes in FDA protocols around things like recalls could then be applied to FSIS as well?

The concern is that those will become the latest, greatest ways to do food safety, and Congress might have a knee-jerk reaction and say, "Well, if it's good for these (FDA-regulated) products then it must be good for the (FSIS-regulated) others." We think the systems are so totally different that the assessments and risk analyses need to be done on their own and in the realm of their own industry.

Two recent recalls involving hydrolyzed vegetable protein and pepper led to meat product recalls. How concerned are you these might make it more complicated to tease out what regulations should apply to FDA-regulated products and what should apply to meat products?

It certainly probably does that, but I think what it tells me is that the industry needs to be very concerned about the source of the supply of its ingredients. They need to treat all their ingredients the way the industry has started to treat beef trim when they are making ground beef. You need performance standards. You need to audit your suppliers. You need to know who is selling your product, because at the end of the day, if that plant has a problem, then that problem is passed on to you.

What are you watching most closely regarding the Child Nutrition Act?

We are watching to make sure they do not set some arbitrary requirements that prevent us from putting safe, wholesome food into the school system and other feeding programs.

What would be an example of where changes in the Child Nutrition Act could affect meat products specifically?

If they set arbitrary limits on fat content, that could be a problem. We all recognize the role of fat and the concerns about that. But there cannot be arbitrary limits. They need to be reasonable limits based on good data; not just a knee-jerk reaction like, "Fat is bad, so we won't have any of it."

Is there anything else NMA is working on you'd like to mention?

There are two other areas we are working on. One is exports. Our limited access to markets is problematic. There is a tremendous amount of potential in meat and poultry if we can get past the artificial barriers that other countries are putting up. We are working closely with USDA and USTR to help facilitate movement in that area.

Another area we are working on is immigration. We are working with ICE to try to get its endorsement of our industry best practices for hiring. It would encourage industry participants to get involved and not feel like there is an attempt by ICE just to raid their plants and have a "gotcha" mentality. We also want ICE to give companies that use best practices consideration as they do their audits.

How are those talks going with ICE?

It's going well. We are meeting with them. They have recently changed their IMAGE (ICE Mutual Agreement between Government and Employers) best practices to make them consistent with the best practices we put together as an industry. What we are still working on now is how they are going to recognize and work with those companies that adopt those practices.

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