Perdue: Fight Back Against “Fear Your Food” Effort

Ag Secretary Sonny Perdue is calling on the agriculture industry to fight back against the "Fear Your Food" movement.  At last week’s 95^th Ag Outlook Forum, Perdue said the “Fear Your Food” movement could harm efforts to feed the world’s soaring population and shouldn’t go unanswered.

"This growing fear has the potential to sideline, deter, critical technologies that we already use, and derail technologies in the pipeline, that we already know how to achieve.”

Perdue urged the Ag community to “connect with the consumer” and “fight” those spreading fear of food.

“We need to be transparent, because we have nothing to hide.  We must get better at telling our own stories, rather than letting others fill in the void.  Consumers need the truth—‘don’t fear your food.’”

Perdue argues, science has proven through exhaustive testing, hundreds of studies and food safety decisions in 28-countries, crop protection tools are safe.

“For example, our own Environmental Protection Agency follows a rigorous, science-based standard for regulating pesticides, used in food production," Perdue noted.  "USDA’s own Agricultural Marketing Service runs a pesticide data program. Here are the facts; in the most recent survey in 2017, more than 99% of sample items, had pesticide residues that did not exceed any of the EPA standards and balances and tolerances, and more than half had no detectible residue at all.”

Perdue added bioengineered crops have even reduced the need for pesticides, noting even the EU deems them safe for import, but won’t let their own farmers grow them.

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