Reser's Expands Recall & Farm Bill by Thanksgiving

Reser's Expands Recall & Farm Bill by Thanksgiving plus Food Forethought. I'm Greg Martin with today's Northwest Report.

Reser's out of Beaverton, Oregon is voluntarily expanding its October 22, 2013 recall of refrigerated ready-to-eat products because they may be contaminated with Listeria monocytogenes. The recalled refrigerated ready-to-eat products were distributed nationwide and Canada. The product is sold in retail and food service establishments. There are no confirmed illnesses associated with these products. The recalled products were manufactured at the Topeka, KS salad manufacturing facility. No other Reser's Fine Foods, Inc. manufacturing facilities are involved in this recall. Consumers who purchased the product may take it back to the store for a refund or discard it.

Well it would truly be something to be thankful for as farm bill conference leaders are saying they hope to get the bill done by the holiday. Collin Peterson says he is meeting this week during a week-long House recess with Ag Chair Frank Lucas and Senate Ag principals in hopes of getting a deal put together.

PETERSON: If we can get to the point where we can put these proposals forward that we might be able to live with then we've got to get them scored by CBO and some of that kind of stuff but I'm optimistic after what the meetings that happened that we're going to finally get in the room, spend some serious time and get this worked out.

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

I know, I know I just said that on Friday a U.S. District judge dismissed a lawsuit by animal welfare groups that sought to prevent the processing of horses, thereby clearing the way for horse slaughter to resume here in the states. Well guess what, in the time it took me to write that report, horse slaughter in the United States is off again. A report from Reuters states that on Monday a federal appeals court in Denver granted an emergency request by animal rights groups to temporarily stop the USDA from providing horse meat inspection services to the two companies that had planned on beginning operations again this week to export horse meat for animal or human consumption. Animal rights groups were able to convince a two judge panel of the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Denver that an emergency injunction was necessary to prevent environmental harm and the violation of federal environmental laws while their appeal of the dismissed lawsuit over horse slaughter is pending. Representatives for both Rains Natural Meats and the Valley Meat Company remain confident that the temporary order will be lifted once the case in it's entirety is presented to the judges.

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