Thursday, August 29, 2013

It has been a while
I will begin posting a workout again and will also be posting things I find interesting about USGvt involvement where it isnt wanted

StaMob

Strength
Deads
5 x 3 at 70%, 75%, 80%, 80%, 85% of one rep max
3 min rest between ea set minimum

Metcon
10x 1/2 bodyweight swings
10x ring bodyrows
carry the kettlebell 40 yd

5 rounds under 7 min

Here is a letter I received from the Farm&Ranch Freedom Alliance
Dear Adam,

The FDA is yet again putting burdens on farmers who use healthy, sustainable practices, and justifying them with fear-based assumptions rather than data.  The agency's latest move is a draft guidance document that will make it all but impossible for farmers with 3,000 or more laying hens to keep the birds on pasture.

Click here for more information about how to take action; keep reading to learn more about the history behind FDA's guidance document.

The stated goal is to prevent the spread of salmonella from wild birds and other animals to the hens.  But there is absolutely no evidence that pastured chickens pose a food safety threat.  To the contrary, all the major incidents of salmonella in eggs have come from confinement factory farms.

Back in 2007, the FDA issued a rule to address the problem with laying hens carrying salmonella and passing it into their eggs.  Under that rule, farms with more than 3,000 hens must take extensive steps to address the risk of salmonella contamination, including testing both the birds and the hen houses.  Thanks to this mandatory testing, FDA now has several years of data on where salmonella has occurred - yet its new guidance document doesn't refer to any cases of salmonella being connected to hens having access to pasture.

Hens that spend time outdoors in the sunlight, eating plants and insects, are healthier than hens crammed closely together inside a building.  Informal testing has also shown that eggs from pastured hens are more nutritious than eggs from hens kept indoors and raised exclusively on grain.

But FDA's draft guidance document creates new burdens specifically for farmers who allow their hens to have access to pasture.  Despite the lack of evidence, the FDA assumes that exposure to any wild animal creates a health risk, and that farmers should have to somehow keep their hens away from wild birds and other creatures.  

The FDA guidance suggests that farmers must cover their outdoor pastures with either roofing or netting, or use noise cannons to scare away wild birds.  Of course, roofing a pasture is not only cost-prohibitive, but would also prevent sun and rain from reaching the plants and animals in the pasture, defeating the whole purpose of having pastured hens.  And the noise cannons that would scare away wild birds would also scare the laying hens.

The FDA, as usual, is favoring the mainstream industry practices.  Although eggs labeled "organic" must allow birds outdoor access, the large-scale industrial operations simply connect small "porches" to their facilities and claim that this is enough.  FDA's guidance document gives the green light to this substandard process, while penalizing the producers who seek to provide true access to pasture.

TAKE ACTION    
    
You can submit comments to FDA through their online system at TIP: We recommend that you write your comment ahead of time and save it on your computer -- there is a time limit when using the Federal Register System, and you may get timed out if you write your comment from scratch. (See sample comments below.)  
 
STEPS:
  1. If your comment is less than one page, you can copy and paste it into the comment box.  If it is longer, you can instead write "see attached" and UPLOAD a separate document, such as a Word or PDF file, with your comments.
  2. Uncheck the box that says "I am submitting on behalf of a third party," so that you do not have to enter an organization name.
  3. For category, select "individual consumer" or "private industry"
  4. Click "continue."
  5. Check the box that you have read and understood the statement, and be sure to click "submit comment."  You should be taken to a new screen with a confirmation number 
Remember, comments are due by September 23, 2013

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