3. Canned meat food product is produced without any semblance of inspection on the part of California State Meat Inspection. A review of retort charts is made by the cannery division of California Food and Drug but no control is maintained over formulation nor daily handling of product. 4. There is a real problem in California with plants which fabricate, bone or otherwise handle meat product in such a manner as to not constitute "processing". These plants are chiefly engaged in supplying hotels, restaurants, ship's stores, and institutions. There is no meat inspection supervision provided for such plants nor for "locker plants". Sanitation and product handling in such plants is often very poor. 5. The City of San Francisco is the last remaining City inspection (state approved). This so called "inspection" is done by the City Health Department and leaves much to be desired. In our opinion, California State Meat Inspection personnel do a very creditable job considering inadequate laws, insufficient personnel and money. No real progress has been made since 1963. Hon. THOMAS S. FOLEY, DONALD D. HILL. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE, House of Representatives. DEAR MR. FOLEY: This replies to your letter of October 17, 1967. You requested additional information on the number of nonfederally inspected plants in each State and the additional poundage of nonfederally inspected meat covered by the Smith-Foley bill. Attached are the charts reflecting the above. Of the 5.24 billion pounds commercially slaughtered in intrastate plants, as shown in Chart II, approximately 98.5 percent would be under Federal inspection under the Smith-Foley bill. Total poundage by States of intrastate processed meats are not available. However, it is estimated nationally that 26 percent representing an amount in excess of 8 billion pounds is processed outside of Federal inspection. Enactment of the Smith-Foley bill is estimated to extend to 97 percent of this amount. Relative to acceptance of U.S. meats, the restrictions on our meat exports are generally based on animal health rather than the public health considerations of the meat consumer. Exceptions to this are the exclusion by Italy of U.S. pork because of the incident of Trichinosis in the United States. Trichinosis is controlled in this country by prescribed methods for heating, drying, or freezing the pork. In 1964, we performed voluntary trichinoscopic examination of pork for export to France. This examination was conducted at the time of the slaughter operation. However, this was discontinued when France accepted our freezing certification for destruction of possible live trichinae. Some other countries require trichinoscopic examination of pork. This could be performed in the United States but is prohibitive from the standpoint of cost. In this respect, work is now under way to develop a practical trichina control program which would be applied at the time of slaughter, thus eliminating any further freezing etc. of the product prior to being exported. It is our plan at this time to make this available on a voluntary basis to those of the industry desiring to export. Italy also requires a certification that the animals from which the meat was derived had never been treated with or fed estrogenic substances-an impossible certification since these are widely used here in feeding cattle. Some of the restrictions on our meat exports related to animal health certifications are those that deal with hog cholera, a disease not transmissible to humans. The United Kingdom and Sweden prohibit the entry of our pork because of existence of this disease. Additional certifications are needed concerning the absence of hog cholera for exporting U.S. pork to France and Germany. Another restriction is that imposed by Germany in acceptance of meat in carcass form only. The latter requirement is based on their insistence of reinspection of the total carcasses on entry. None of the present prohibitions or restrictions on export of U.S. meat and Two sets of this 1962 and 1967 USDA surveys and a copy each of the Federal Sincerely yours, RODNEY E. LEONARD, CHART 1.-OUR ESTIMATES OF THE NUMBERS OF NONFEDERALLY INSPECTED PLANTS LISTED BY STATES Chart 11-COMMERCIAL SLAUGHTER-POUNDAGE AND PERCENT COMPARISON-FEDERAL VERSUS STATE FOR DEAR MR. FOLEY: This is in reply to your letter of August 30, 1967. You re- An excerpt of each question is stated and followed by our reply. Question (1): What are total cost estimates (state and Federal) to bring all state meat inspection programs covering packing and processing establishments having an annual gross income of $250,000 or less up to the quality of the Federal Meat Inspection Program? Answer: $13,650,000. This is based on an estimated existing 15,000 slaughter and processing plants not under Federal inspection. Of the 15,000, best estimates are that 8,976 plants would have an annual gross volume of $250,000 or less. Question (2): What is the number of additional packing and processing plants that would be covered by Federal inspection as provided by the Smith-Foley bill in each State? 1 The information pertaining to numbers of processing plants in these States is either incomplete or undetermined. Question (3): What is the additional poundage and percentage of meat and meat food products that would be covered by the Smith-Foley bill for each State that is out of the currently non-federally inspected poundage? Answer: We do not have this information by each State. Reported estimates available are based on total National estimates. We will attempt to obtain figures from those States that have an active meat inspection program. From these figures we will extrapolate estimates for the remaining States. As soon as this is determined it will be submitted for your study and use. Question (4): (a) What are estimates of manpower constraints on expansion of Federal and state meat inspection programs? Answer: We have estimated for the Federal program that additional total man-years required by the inclusion of present intrastate plants with an annual gross over $250,000 would come to 3,295. Estimated man-years necessary for the State programs involving plants of $250,000 or less annual volume is 1,440. With this as background manpower constraint would principally involve the lack of available trained inspection personnel, both professional and non-professional— the lack of available non-professional personnel with background and experience for rapid and full utilization in a meat inspection program-limited numbers and capacity of Federal training facilities—lack of funds appropriated by State legislators for a comprehensive meat inspection system-unfavorable salaries to attract adequate numbers of personnel, especially of the professional segment. This problem is common to both the States and the Federal Government. Question (4) (b) What is the reservoir of trained manpower? Answer: A reservoir of trained personnel is practically non-existent. A possible source of professional manpower are those veterinarians retiring from the military service. Presently they are not attracted to Federal service because of the dual compensation limitation. Another source of professional manpower that would require only limited orientation and training, would be to cross-utilize the USDA veterinary personnel of the Agricultural Research Service. Question (4): (c) How much lead time to train additional manpower? Answer: It is estimated that at least a year would be needed before any significant numbers of inspection personnel could be fully trained. Question (4): (d) What expedients may safely be utilized to overcome serious manpower constraints? Answer: 1. Increase capacity and numbers of Federal training facilities to train both state and Federal employees. 2. Initiate a program of gaining compliance of processed meat and meat food products through a rigorous market sampling and laboratory analysis program. Thus reducing the number of resident processed meat inspectors required. As soon as the information not included in this reply is developed, it will be forwarded to you. We appreciate your continued interest and support of effective meat inspection. Sincerely yours, RODNEY E. LEONARD, Deputy Assistant Secretary. Mr. FOLEY. I do not want to labor some of the points that have already been made by Miss Furness and by my friend from Iowa, Mr. Smith. The committee has heard very eloquently from both of them. I was particularly delighted to hear in the statements of both Senator Mondale and Senator Montoya their praise for Mr. Smith. I am a relative latecomer to this fight for improved meat inspection, but Mr. Smith has been one of the pioneers. Constructive and timely solutions to the problem have been supported by organized labor led by the Amalgamated Meat Cutters & Butcher Workmen, by elements of the press and television and certainly by such outstanding analysts and consumer advocates as Mr. Ralph Nader. The problem that now faces the subcommittee in the Senate is which bill to enact-what means of extending the coverage of Federal meat inspection standards should be approved by the Congress. First of all, there was some misrepresentation of the Smith-Foley amendment in the House of Representatives and in the material published by the American Meat Institute and others. One form of this misrepresentation asserted that the Smith-Foley bill "exempted" all plants of $250,000 gross annual business or less from Federal inspection. The implication there was that even if the plants were in interstate commerce and had a gross annual business of $250,000 or less, they would not be subject to Federal inspection under the SmithFoley bill. That, of course, is false. The Smith-Foley bill embraced all meat plants in interstate commerce as currently defined in the Federal meat inspection law and extended Federal coverage to all plants having a gross annual business in excess of $250,000. It was suggested in the House that we "exempted" plants having a gross annual business of $250,000 or less which was rather ironic since the Purcell bill did nothing at all to bring any of them under mandatory Federal inspection. It only provided (as did our bill) for matching Federal assistance to State meat inspection programs meeting Federal standards. |