Senate bill requires food tests

The state Senate passed a weakened food-safety bill Wednesday that requires food testing for contamination in some cases.

Food processors would be given the option of creating and following food-safety plans that would have to be approved by the state.

Senate Bill 80, which passed 50-0, was introduced in response to the nationwide salmonella outbreak traced to tainted peanut butter linked to the Peanut Corp. of America processing plant in Blakely.

The outbreak has sickened more than 600 people and may have been responsible for nine deaths.

Bill sponsor John Bulloch (R-Ochlocknee) said his legislation would require food processors to report any contamination they found through testing within 24 hours to the state Department of Agriculture. Companies would have to keep records for two years.

The new reporting requirements would raise “a red flag” with the state if contamination were found, Bulloch said. The beleaguered peanut processing plant is in his district.

Bulloch called the bill “a step in the right direction.”

The bill underwent a big change from previous versions in a last-minute amendment introduced on the Senate floor by Bulloch.

Under the amendment, which passed, a food processor could be exempted from the Department of Agriculture’s testing rules if it submits a safety plan and the state approves it.

Consumer-protection advocates say the bill does not provide standards for such safety plans.

“It leaves it up to the company to determine the level of testing it wants to do,” said Chris Waldrop, director of the Food Policy Institute of the Consumer Protection Federation.

“It may be less rigorous than the regular testing the state wants to do,” he said.

Agriculture Commissioner Tommy Irvin said he had no knowledge of the amendment and that it had not been run by him.