Protecting Food. Empowering Whistleblowers.
Protecting Food. Empowering Whistleblowers.
Today is National Whistleblower Appreciation Day! This important occasion was established last year to recognize the brave contributions of whistleblowers to combat waste, fraud, abuse and violations of laws. Every worker along the food supply chain is a potential witness to wrongdoing, and the Food Integrity Campaign aims to ensure these individuals have adequate rights […]
If you’re concerned about genetically engineered (GE) food and their impact, then you should be concerned about what’s happening in Kauai. Get this: the giant chemical companies in Kauai – the ones that spray pesticides year-round on their GE crops – are now actually playing the victim card. Really, biotechs? Everybody knows it’s the local […]
This week, the USDA submitted a new draft version of its controversial poultry inspection plan to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB). It’s the OMB’s role to review regulatory policy and set the president’s budget (which, in turn, dictates rulemaking priorities). While there might be changes to the proposal in response to public comments, […]
Finding out that the chicken on your plate has been through an intense chemical bath is not very appetizing, but industry insiders and whistleblowers feel you should know the truth about poultry, the largest segment of U.S. agriculture. USDA poultry inspectors have been raising concerns about the dangerous changes in the industry for years, including […]
When most people think of Hawaii, they picture a beautiful and pristine tropical paradise. That’s what the FIC team thought too, until concerned citizen activists sought our help in exposing the improper influence of biotech companies on state legislators and officials. As it turns out, major biotech companies like BASF and Syngenta have taken an […]
Have you ever seen something wrong in the workplace and felt like you should speak up? Everyday people witness waste, fraud, and abuses of power in the workplace but are unsure what to do about it. The stakes are high. Making the ethical decision can be hard when blowing the whistle can be a career-ending […]
Empowering whistleblowers who are on the front lines of the food supply is the best way to keep the system transparent and wrongdoers accountable. But until a culture is created in which blowing the whistle is expected and rewarded, the dire situation of secrecy and repeat violations without accountability that currently exists will only continue. […]
Animal agriculture is one of the top contributors to our most serious environmental problems, producing 18 percent of all greenhouse gas emissions worldwide. FIC works with whistleblowers who reveal horrific stories of contamination due to routine factory farm practices. Just last week, the Environmental Protection Agency fined a meat processing plant in Lancaster, Pennsylvania $40,000 […]
Thus far, Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack has failed to acknowledge the concerns of USDA poultry inspectors regarding his agency’s proposal to increase line speeds and privatize inspection at processing plants. The USDA Food Safety Inspection Service (FSIS), despite being the public health arm of the agency, seems to be promoting industry profit, as corporations stand […]
Last year, Tennessee was the only state whose legislature passed an Ag Gag bill aimed at silencing whistleblowers who expose abuse on industrial farms. Ten other states introduced similar measures, but each bill ultimately died in state legislatures. FIC was part of a strong campaign against these terrible pieces of legislation, and after a groundswell […]