Foundation for Accountability in Regulatory Enforcement (FARE)John Munsell ran a USDA-inspected meat plant for 34 years, which had been in the family for 59 years. Raised in Miles City, Montana and educated at Montana State University in Bozeman, MT, John returned to the family business subsequent to employment at Continental Oil and Target Stores. Having sold the business in 2005, John subsequently opened a deli/bakery at a local retail grocery store, and is currently employed by Miles Community College as a Biofuels/Renewable Energy Coordinator. Married, with two daughters and six grandchildren, John's passionate focus has been to reveal institutionalized shortcomings in USDA's deregulated meat inspection program, and to protect the rights of small plants to remain in business in the absence of unethical government enforcement actions.
On February 2, I wrote a commentary that appeared on Food Safety News entitled "USDA Inspected and Approved High-Risk Meat." One sentence in the editorial stated "USDA has concluded that Hannaford's high risk practices likely led to this outbreak," a reference to Salmonella infections linked to supermarket ground beef. Investigators were unable to trace the contaminated ground beef to any one...
The Hannaford chain of grocery stores in the Northeast recently recalled ground beef products which were laced with an antibiotic-resistant strain of Salmonella. Like most other retail chains, Hannafords purchases all its meat from outside source slaughter plants. Salmonella and E. coli are "enteric" bacterium, which is defined as originating from within animals' intestines, and is thus present in manure. Live...
The U.S. Department of Agriculture announced Monday that it would close 5 of its 15 Food Safety and Inspection (FSIS) District Offices as part of a consolidation that will decrease the agency's budget and save taxpayer dollars.This financially prudent move prompted Andrew Lorenz, deputy district manager of the agency's office in Minneapolis, one of the five offices to be closed,...
On Aug. 3, 2011, U.S. Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack gave a speech in Milwaukee that included the following statement:"In 90 days, I expect the agency [FSIS] to announce the first step in transforming our traceback policy".The USDA"s Food Safety and Inspection Service announcement is now six weeks overdue, and the agency has yet to publicly announce even "THE FIRST STEP"...
The National Research Council (NRC) recently suggested that FSIS release of establishment-specific data could benefit food safety. Pertinent excerpts of media reports include the following statements:"Substantial benefits can be gained by publicly posting (a) enforcement data from reports written by inspectors, and (b) testing data from standard laboratory tests." "The report comes in light of the Obama administration's push for increased...
If USDA's Food Safety Inspection Service (FSIS) had been assigned the responsibility to investigate last years' oil spill in the Gulf, and provide solutions, the agency would have concluded:1.) Louisiana, Mississippi, and other states are responsible for the environmental degradation because they allowed contaminants to enter their boundaries.2.) Petroleum is a contaminant only when it arrives at the destination, namely, the coastlines....
Editor's note: Last week we concluded a series by John Munsell that explained how his small meat plant in Miles City, MT, ran afoul of USDA's meat inspection practices. John asked us to post one more article as a coda to his saga.After my meat plant recalled 270 pounds of ground beef potentially contaminated with E. coli O157:H7 in January,...
Editor's Note: This is the ninth and final installment in a series written by John Munsell of Miles City, MT, who explains how the small meat plant his family owned for 59 years ran afoul of USDA's meat inspection program. The events he writes about began a decade ago, but remain relevant today.The primary focus of this narrative is the...
Editor's Note: This is the eighth installment in a series written by John Munsell of Miles City, MT, who explains how the small meat plant his family owned for 59 years ran afoul of USDA's meat inspection program. The events he writes about began a decade ago, but remain relevant today.The Food Safety and Inspection Service's justification for saying I...
Editor's Note: This is the seventh installment in a series written by John Munsell of Miles City, MT, who explains how the small meat plant his family owned for 59 years ran afoul of USDA's meat inspection program. The events he writes about began a decade ago, but remain relevant today.Back in full swing again, authorized to grind under the...
Editor's Note: This is the sixth installment in a series written by John Munsell of Miles City, MT, who explains how the small meat plant his family owned for 59 years ran afoul of USDA's meat inspection program. The events he writes about began a decade ago, but remain relevant today.How does our industry respond to the issues of E....
Editor's Note: This is the fifth installment in a series written by John Munsell of Miles City, MT, who explains how the small meat plant his family owned for 59 years ran afoul of USDA's meat inspection program. The events he writes about began a decade ago, but remain relevant today.On Oct. 12, 2002, Pilgrim's Pride Corporation, doing business as...
Editor's Note: This is the fourth installment in a series written by John Munsell of Miles City, MT, who explains how the small meat plant his family owned for 59 years ran afoul of USDA's meat inspection program. The events he writes about began a decade ago, but remain relevant today.In May 2005, Dr. Gary Acuff, a microbiologist who heads...
Editor's Note: This is the third installment in a series written by John Munsell of Miles City, MT, who explains how the small meat plant his family owned for 59 years ran afoul of USDA's meat inspection program. The events he writes about began a decade ago, but remain relevant today.On June 30, 2002, after my grinder had been shut...
Editor's Note: This is the second installment in a series written by John Munsell of Miles City, MT, who explains how the small meat plant his family owned for 59 years ran afoul of USDA's meat inspection program. The events he writes about began a decade ago, but remain relevant today.Prior to discussing negotiations in the following months between FSIS...
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