A 2007 video on Country of Origin Labeling is relevant today – “In this case, what you don’t know can hurt you.”
- The U.S. Congress repealed country of origin labeling (COOL) for beef and pork in late 2015, just ahead of Ag Secretary Vilsack opening the border for Brazilian fresh beef imports in August of 2016.
- Why was COOL repealed for only beef and pork? The Brazilian company, JBS, the world’s biggest meat packer and criminal actor, is advantaged if Americans don’t know that what they’re eating is the cheapest source of beef in the world. The Chinese company, Smithfield, the largest pork producer in the world, also benefits if consumers don’t know.
- After successfully repealing COOL, a law that 95% of Americans supported, House Majority Speaker, John Boehner, left Congress to join the JBS board of directors. The price U.S. ranchers received for calves was cut in half.
- Why did Food Safety Inspection Service (FSIS) Administrator, Al Almanza, allow rotten meat from Brazil into our country for 90 days after it was made public? Following the rotten meat news in Brazil, cattle producers there were offered twenty to thirty percent of the former value for their cattle. Who is really paying JBS’s $3.1 billion fine for corruption?
- Upon resigning as head of our nation’s food safety agency, Almanza went to work for JBS.
- Shortly after Almanza joined JBS, a rat infestation forced the temporary shutdown of the JBS Souderton, Pennsylvania beef plant. Why wasn’t the plant officially suspended by FSIS, instead of the far more lenient temporary shutdown?
