More Troubles for Nestle & Fad Diets

More Troubles for Nestle & Fad Diets plus Food Forethought. I’m Greg Martin with today’s Northwest Report.

I’m sure if you are like me you are in a perpetual diet mode although I’m not one to jump into every fad diet that comes along, just good healthy eating. But those fad diets have a bigger downside. Farmers who raise wheat, and the people who make wheat-based foods like bread and pasta, have suffered because of low-carb diets. Judi Adams President of the U.S. Grain Foods Foundation - says diet fads come and go.

ADAMS: Right now we’re sort of in a lull and I think our industry is getting a little complacent because we don’t have big threats out there but it will be back. It’s really interesting when you look at the statistics that people don’t always like to do, people that eat the highest percentage of carbs in their diet have the lowest body weight. So carbs got a bad rap some time ago and what we try and teach is all foods in moderation and exercise.

The FDA has found two different strains of E. coli 0157 in the recalled samples of Nestlé Toll House cookie dough, neither matching the type that caused the nationwide outbreak of illness. Tests of a package from Minnesota show contamination from E. coli 0124. Assistant Commissioner for Food Safety at the FDA David Acheson said it’s probably going to remain a mystery. Nestlé began producing cookie dough again on July 7^th after getting new suppliers for flour, eggs and margarine.

Now with today’s Food Forethought, here’s Lacy Gray.

In regard to the recently passed climate change bill there appears to be no love loss on behalf of the ag industry. This legislation which seeks to regulate greenhouse gas emissions by placing a cap on them will impose strict fuel efficiency standards and mandate greater use of renewable energy sources. Carbon intensive industries will be allowed to buy carbon offsets that will permit them to continue emitting greenhouse gases until said time that they are running more efficiently. There is no way around the fact that this legislation will be costly to the agriculture industry, but it comes as no surprise. We knew it was coming. Waiting to impose such legislation would not make it any easier or less costly; it would only prolong the inevitable. As much as most farmers would have liked to have avoided this there is no way around it. Like most hard decisions it doesn’t get any easier the longer you put it off. Yes, it is going to be costly in the onset, but to think we can continue down the same path without regard to our environment could be even more costly indeed.

Thanks Lacy. That’s today’s Northwest Report. I’m Greg Martin on the Northwest Ag Information Network.