Food Traceability Report articles from November 2009

Food Traceability Report archives from November 2009

NOSB defers action on banning nanotech from organic program.(ORGANICS)
November 1, 2009... After three days of spirited comment and debate, the National Organic Standards Board on Nov. 5 decided to return to its Materials Committee for further work a proposed recommendation to ban nanotechnology from production, handling and packaging...

European Commission adopts animal welfare labeling report.(LABELING)
November 1, 2009... The European Commission has adopted a report outlining a series of options for animal welfare labeling aimed at sparking an in-depth political debate with other EU institutions. The ultimate objective is to create a policy that will provide...

Mark your calendars.(ADVENTITIOUS TRACES)(Conference notes)
November 1, 2009... MARK YOUR CALENDARS: FDA and USDA's Food Safety and Inspection Service have scheduled a public meeting Dec. 9-10 to discuss product tracing systems for food safety purposes. In a lengthy notice in the Nov. 3 Federal Register, FDA says the...

Seafood quality.(ADVENTITIOUS TRACES)
November 1, 2009... SEAFOOD QUALITY: NSF International, a food inspection and certification organization based in Ann Arbor, Mich., has acquired Surefish, Inc., a Washington State-based seafood quality specialist and provider of independent seafood inspections and...

Good produce practices.(ADVENTITIOUS TRACES)(food standards and safety)(Conference notes)
November 1, 2009... GOOD PRODUCE PRACTICES: Some 50 produce industry leaders from every stage of the supply chain have come together to begin work on a major initiative to drive harmonization of standards and audits for Good Agricultural Practices, according to the...

Traceable salads.(ADVENTITIOUS TRACES)
November 1, 2009... TRACEABLE SALADS: Kroger is promoting a new line of salads that allows customers to see where the produce came from. As part of the "Quality You Can Trace" program, each bag of pre-washed, ready-to-serve packaged salad carries a 16-digit code...

EU ag commissioner warns of livestock industry disaster.(GRAINS)
November 1, 2009... European Agriculture Commissioner Mariann Fischer Boel last month warned that the EU's livestock industry could face "disaster" caused by foot-dragging over approval of genetically engineered crops (see FTR October, Page 4). In an Oct. 15...

EU looks to canola to replace soy, but supply uncertain.(GRAINS)
November 1, 2009... The European Union's zero-tolerance policy toward imports of unauthorized biotech soybeans works in favor of canola and other vegetable oil crops. However, demand is difficult to match, according to a recent report by Rabobank, a European...

Source of transgenic flax in Canada remains a mystery.(GRAINS)
November 1, 2009... Trying to find the source of genetically engineered flax seeds that have been detected in Europe in shipments from Canada is proving a lot more complicated than originally expected, reports Barry Hall, president of the Flax Council of Canada. ...

Monsanto asks Supreme Court to review roundup ready alfalfa ban.
November 1, 2009... Monsanto Company has asked the U.S. Supreme Court to review a lower court's decision to ban the planting of Roundup Ready alfalfa pending completion of an Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) by USDA's Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service....

Canadian pork industry makes traceability improvements.(MEAT, POULTRY & FISH)
November 1, 2009... After years of trailing the pack in adoption of traceability systems, Canada's pork sector is now one of the leaders, says Clare Schlegel, chairman of the Canadian Pork Council's identification & traceability working committee. "We're as...

Mollusks take priority in Mexican seafood traceability.(MEAT, POULTRY & FISH)
November 1, 2009... Health concerns regarding mollusks have led Mexico's Aquaculture Sanitation Commission to launch an ambitious plan to expand its seafood traceability system. The National Sanitation Service (Senasica) has joined the Aquaculture Sanitation...

New initiative aims to put Brazil's cattle ID system back on track.
November 1, 2009... Addressing widespread criticism of Brazil's cattle traceability system (Sisbov), the agriculture ministry has proposed regulatory changes that would partially privatize the system. The proposed changes, which would allow private sector...

U.S. blocks Canadian and Mexican requests for COOL review.(LABELING)
November 1, 2009... The United States on Oct. 23 blocked requests by Canada and Mexico for a World Trade Organization dispute panel to examine U.S. country-of-origin labeling (COOL) rules. Both Canada and Mexico told the WTO's dispute settlement body that the...

Democratic senators introduce controversial dairy COOL bill.(LABELING)
November 1, 2009... Sens. Al Franken (D-Minn.), Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio) Russ Feingold (D-Wis.) and Amy Klochubar (D-Minn.) have introduced the Dairy COOL Act (S 1783), which would extend mandatory country-of-origin labeling to dairy products, including milk, cheese,...

Chile responds to looming EU animal welfare label.(LABELING)
November 1, 2009... After years of political wrangling, Chilean legislators still haven't come up with a comprehensive animal welfare law, causing other actors to take matters into their own hands. Victor Venegas, director of the agriculture ministry's...

Survey finds 8 in 10 British consumers want COOL.(LABELING)
November 1, 2009... Some 80% of consumers in the United Kingdom want country-of-origin labels on meat and poultry so they can "buy British," according to a survey conducted by the consumer advocacy organization Which?. The research also found COOL considered...

Animal welfare group criticizes USDA's "grass fed" standard. (LABELING.
November 1, 2009... Responding to an announcement that La Cense Ranch has become the first grassfed beef producer to be certified under USDA's "grass fed" labeling standard, Andrew Gunther, program director for Washington-based Animal Welfare Approved, issued an...

Australian organic products standard receives qualified support.(ORGANICS)
November 1, 2009... Hailed as "a significant step forward" by Standards Australia (SA), the nation's premier standards body, a new organic and biodynamic products standard is receiving only qualified support from the Biological Farmers of Australia (BFA), the...

UK consumers seen holding inaccurate view of organic.(ORGANICS)
November 1, 2009... A large proportion of organic food consumers in Great Britain have an unrealistic view of the term "organic," and their expectations often go significantly beyond organic certification requirements, the UK Department for Environment, Food and...

Cornucopia targets target in complaint to USDA's organic program.
November 1, 2009... The Cornucopia Institute has filed formal complaints with USDA's National Organic Program (NOP), and with Wisconsin and Minnesota officials, alleging that Target Corporation has misled consumers into thinking some conventional food items it...

New members named to National Organic Standards Board.(ORGANIC)(John Foster, Joe Dickson and Jay Feldman appointed)(Brief article)
November 1, 2009... Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack has named five members to the National Organic Standards Board. Their five year terms will run from Jan. 24, 2010 to Jan. 24, 2015. The appointees include: Joe Dickson, an organic retailer from Austin, Texas,...

Don't count NAIS out yet!(TRACEABILITY TOOLBOX)(National Animal Identification System )
November 1, 2009... No sooner had pundits pronounced last rites for USDA's National Animal Identification System (NAIS) than a combination of circumstances breathed new life back into the program. Market forces aligned with a simplified tracking technology and some...

Proposed decentralization policy seen fostering biotech crops in EU.(REGULATORY WATCH)
November 1, 2009... A proposal by the Netherlands allowing individual European Union member-states to block cultivation of EU-authorized biotech crops could ironically make it easier to grow such crops in Europe, according to an article in The Ecologist magazine....

Polish government proposes bill for biotech crop zones.(REGULATORY WATCH)
November 1, 2009... The Polish government has introduced a draft biosafety law that would allow farmers to create zones for growing biotech crops. The proposed legislation aims to harmonize Polish law with European Union legislation allowing cultivation of...

Traceability interoperability summit.(PRODUCTS & SERVICES)
November 1, 2009... Traceability interoperability summit. The Colorado-based Traceability Institute has scheduled a summit conference, Jan. 21-22, in Denver designed to initiate consensus on multi-system interoperability with the goal of accomplishing a more...

Lifecycle management solutions.(PRODUCTS & SERVICES)
November 1, 2009... Lifecycle management solutions. Oracle, based in Redwood Shores, Calif., has rolled out enhancements to its Agile Product Lifecycle Management (PLM) for Process product, which is aimed at enabling food and beverage manufacturers to more easily...

Compliance software solutions.(PRODUCTS & SERVICES)
November 1, 2009... Compliance software solutions. CDC Software, based in Atlanta, has signed a reciprocal original equipment manufacturer agreement with Pilgrim Software, Inc., based in Hong Kong, under which both companies will sell each other's solutions. The...

Machine vision applications.(PRODUCTS & SERVICES)
November 1, 2009... Machine vision applications. PPT VISION, Inc., based in Bloomington, Minn., has announced its 8.5 release of IMPACT software, which the company says reads three times more barcodes than the previous version, providing an ideal solution for a...

Auction market management.(PRODUCTS & SERVICES)
November 1, 2009... Auction market management. Integrated Traceability Solutions, based in Lexington, Ky., supplies the livestock industry with a variety of software, hardware and animal identification devices. They also offer services that provide a turnkey,...

GlobalGAP gains acceptance among Brazilian fruit producers.(TRENDS)
November 1, 2009... Frustrated small- to medium-scale Brazilian fruit producers find themselves increasingly isolated from premium foreign markets by a slew of external environmental, labor, and sanitation requirements. However, rather than limit themselves to...