Bill would cut state involvement in direct food sales from producers

Bill would cut state involvement in direct food sales from producers

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SALT LAKE CITY — Ms. America joined Rep. Marc Roberts, R-Santaquin, at a news conference Friday to express her support of the proposed Food Freedom Act.

"This bill is something that I fully stand behind," Ms. America Julie Harman said.

Roberts explained that the bill would cut out state involvement in food sales conducted directly between a producer and a consumer. Under the bill, milk and poultry would not be regulated in such sales.

Producers could even sell baked goods to their neighbors, Roberts said, but meat would still be subject to the same regulations.

The bill would require producers to identify to consumers that the products have not been inspected, Roberts said, but it's up to them to determine whether they want to do that with a label or verbally.

Sterling Brown, vice president of public policy for the Utah Farm Bureau, addressed the House Democratic caucus Tuesday to express the bureau's opposition to the bill.

"Consumer confidence is imperative to a sustainable, viable, growing agriculture industry in this state and throughout the globe," Brown told the caucus, citing foodborne illness as a major concern.

Ms. America Julie Harman laughs while putting on her crown in Midvale Wednesday, Sept. 16, 2015. (Photo: Jeffrey D. Allred/Deseret News File Photo)
Ms. America Julie Harman laughs while putting on her crown in Midvale Wednesday, Sept. 16, 2015. (Photo: Jeffrey D. Allred/Deseret News File Photo)

But Roberts said problems with foodborne illness would be solved by eliminating regulation. Reducing the number of steps in the process, he said, also lowers the chance of exposure to foodborne illnesses.

"I don't want to be naive and say that no one will ever get sick. It will happen, and it currently happens in our regulated system," Roberts said. "When people get sick, there's huge recalls. Those recalls cover multistates and hundreds of thousands of people. In the event somebody got sick in this scenario, it's very local."

"Any direct farm-to-fork transaction, I think that's good," Brown said, expressing his support for local farmers. But he added the stipulation that the food needs to be inspected so consumers can be confident in what they're eating.

Harman, a Utah native, said food safety is "really important to me as a single mom."

"I care about what they eat and what they consume, as well as myself," she said, adding that knowing where her food comes from is important to her. "I would love to know from a local farmer what they put into the food, how they took care of it, how they processed it. When I go to the grocery store, I don't necessarily know those details."

Harman said the bill supports her Ms. America platform: "Be prepared, be responsible, and become self-reliant."

"I really support this bill because I believe that in order to become a more self-reliant society, I fell that our local farmers in not only Utah, but states across the country need the respect and ability to farm," she said, noting that regulations can prevent farms from sustaining themselves.

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Emily Larson

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