At a stop in Boise, ID, last week, Oregon Congressman Greg Walden, a Republican representing Oregon’s Second Congressional District, stopped to discuss FDA’s proposed food safety rules before heading to eastern Oregon to to discuss the issue with local onion producers.
The proposed rules would focus on how clean irrigation water should be. The rules appear to suggest that irrigation water be as clean as that used for drinking water. This, it is feared, could have an impact on onion production in some states. Walden told KTVB.com that bulbs and onions do no pose a food safety risk via irrigation water and should not be included with food types that are.
“There’s no evidence of salmonella being passed through dry onions, bulb onions,” said Walden. “And so there isn’t the food safety issue.”
The biggest concern, he says, is the cost to onion growers to treat the water. “There’s no way you could afford to treat agriculture water that we use out in this part of the West to recreational standards, and plus run it up and down the lines and the ditches and all, and get it to that level.”
The public comment period for these rules is open until Sept. 15. The rules will not be implemented until after FDA evaluates the comments.
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