Made in USA: Meat

July 23, 2007

Late last Thursday, July 19th, the House Agriculture Committee approved an agreement on Country of Origin Labeling (COOL) for beef and pork. This agreement comes after months of headlines recounting food safety nightmares, so I had little doubt that this would happen. After all, these regulations, put forth by the Farm Bill in 2002, were supposed to take effect by 2004.

It's been a battle of the lobbyists, and until now, COOL looked doomed. It's sad that we've had to experience the illnesses (of both humans and pets) for food producers to wake up to the reality of what we consumers yearn for.

So, what can we expect to see on our meat labels in October 2008?

Packages of ground beef would have to list all the countries of the cattle that went into the product. For example, you may see something like "The beef in this package may come from cattle born in the U.S.A., Mexico, Canada, or Argentina". This agreement includes three categories of labeling: one that indicates the product was born, raised, and slaughtered in the United States; one that indicates that product was not exclusively born, raised, and slaughtered in the U.S.; and one that includes products entirely from other countries. For ground meat, products can be labeled with a list of countries where product may have originated.

It seems that the key to the labeling agreement was: Meat from cattle born in Mexico or from Canadian-born pigs would have to include those countries on the label. The beef would be labeled as a product of the United States and Mexico. The pork would be called a product of the United States and Canada.

Better than what we have now, but not as clear as I, for one, would like; especially that this agreement reduces penalties and paperwork requirements in the law.

COOL labeling for seafood is already in effect, and the fruit and vegetable industry still has to work out an agreement to cover produce.

We consumers have an obligation to make sure that clear labeling is not only something we desire, but something we deserve. Send an email to COOL@USDA.GOV to make our voice heard. The sooner, the better – The House of Representatives is expected to vote on the Farm Bill before the end of July.

Copies of the bill considered by the Committee and the amendments that were adopted are available on the Committee's website at: http://agriculture.house.gov/inside/2007FarmBill.html.

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