Killing customers is bad for business.

Especially the valued repeat customer.

It’s also bad for business to make customers barf.

But, companies do it all the time, so there is a need for regulation, a legal system, and public oversight to at least embarrass so-called leaders into providing safe food.

It’s a little weird when an organic type, under questioning about safety, resorts to a big ag line (for those foodies who like to distinguish based on size and conspiracy theories).

Christine Bushway of the Organic Trade Association told the Associated Press one of the best checks on food safety is the devastating effect a recall or foodborne illness outbreak can have on a company’s bottom line.

“It’s just good business to make sure you are putting the safest products on the market,” she says.

The comments were in a story about the perceived safety of organic foods in light of repeated recalls and outbreaks –like the salmonella that sickened six in Minn. and was linked to organic eggs.

While sales for food produced on smaller operations have exploded, partially fueled by a consumer backlash to food produced by larger companies, a new set of food safety challenges has emerged. And small farm operations have been exempted from food safety laws as conservatives, farmers and food-lovers have worried about too much government intervention and regulators have struggled with tight budgets.

Bushway of the Organic Trade Association did get it right when she said food safety comes down to proper operation of a farm or food company, not its scale.

“How is the farm managed? How much effort is put into food safety? If you don’t have really good management, it doesn’t matter.”

But she misses out on an opportunity to once again stress organic is a production system with almost nothing to do with microbial food safety -- the stuff that makes people barf.

Auditors, certifiers, validators, grease monkeys, soil farmers, they’re all supposed to make things better.

But claims are nothing more than claims in the absence of data.

And anyone who has to say, “trust me,” is immediately untrustworthy.

So when Laura Telford, executive director of the Canadian Organic Growers, told Canadian news types a couple of weeks ago, “I’m not certain the world needs to know the exact reason why this company lost its certification. I personally feel that its enough to know that CFIA is doing its job ... and when a company is not following the rules, there will be consequences,” howls of cynical guffawing ensued among those familiar with the Canadian Food Inspection Agency.

A few weeks ago, Lynne Moore reported in the Montreal Gazette that on June 30, 2009, the Organic Products Regulations came into effect under the Canadian Food Inspection Agency.

The regulations provided for a transition period, a two-year span that would allow everyone to align their operations to the new reality and take care of practical matters such as using up existing packaging.

In a July 27, 2011, notice, the Canada Organic Office said Jirah Milling and Sales Inc., of Ormstown, Que., was no longer authorized to market organic products or use the Canada Organic logo (the logo that would now be recognized by the U.S. and the EU).

The notice of suspension of organic certification was sent to industry and certification bodies, but the document was not publicly disseminated by the federal body on a website or via a media release.

The Montreal Gazette found the government's suspension notice about one of Eastern Canada's most significant international organic dealers on the "newsroom" page of U.S. Department of Agriculture’s website. It wasn't deemed newsworthy in Canada, but it was in the U.S.

Michel Saumur, the office's national manager and program spokesman, would not provide information about the scope of Jirah's corporate activities, wouldn't discuss complaints received about the company, wouldn't say why its certification was suspended - and subsequently cancelled - and would not even disclose which certifying body had accredited Jirah.

Email inquiries to CFIA's media office finally generated a response on Friday afternoon. The Organic Products Regulations "do not have provisions for fines and additional penalties at this time."

So it's something like getting caught for driving so fast you lose your licence, but aren't fined.

The number one health concern with meat is making sure it’s cooked enough to kill dangerous bacteria, which is something both conventionally and organically produced meats have.

So says Dr. Dana Hanson, a meat specialist in North Carolina State University's Food Science Department in a piece for WRAL (see below).

“The end result is a healthy food product in either scenario. To say that one is better or more healthy than the other is, quite frankly, a stretch.”

There are also debates about animal treatment, environmental concerns and how antibiotics may impact bacteria strains. But those debates are separate from the nutrition and safety of the meat we ultimately eat.

Those comments were markedly different than those from producers of specialty meats

Ritchie Roberts of Double R Cattle Services Farm near Hillsborough said,

“I know that my beef is all grass-fed and handled correctly and is super good and nutritious for you 'cause I know what goes into it. and I have control of that. It boils down to that sense of being able to support maybe a local industry and that's really where the benefits of organic come in.”

Draft owner Dean Ogan says, “The most important thing for us is to know where it came from, know who produced it, know the process.”

All worthy objectives -- that have nothing to do with safety.
 

With an appeal to the simplistic, Barbara Laino says, “We know processed foods are wrong for us. It has to be wrong for them. If you can feed yourself healthily and your children, then you can feed your pets healthily, too. It really isn’t that hard.”

Laino is talking about the standard recipe she uses to feed her Alaskan malamute, another dog and three cats in her house for around 10 days: grind 40 pounds of pasture-raised chicken necks with another 20 pounds of chicken giblets. To this, she adds five pounds of carrots, a whole cabbage and several other fruits, all from the organic fields of Midsummer Farm, Ms. Laino’s farm in Warwick, N.Y. Finally, she blends the mix with herbs and supplements.

She tells the New York Times in a piece of pet food porn that she wants for her pets what she wants for herself: a healthy diet of unprocessed organic foods. And now she teaches others.

Cesar Millan, host of the television show “The Dog Whisperer,” says, “The dog has always been a mirror of the human style of life. Organic has become a new fashion, a new style of living.”

Cesar got the lifestyle bit right, because that is all it is; as for microbiological safety, the cross-contamination risks alone in the food prep sound daunting.

Nancy K. Cook, the vice president at the Pet Food Institute, a trade association for commercial pet food makers, cautions pet owners that it is hard to create a balanced diet at home, since dogs and cats have specific nutritional requirements.

Joseph J. Wakshlag, a clinical nutritionist at the Baker Institute for Animal Health at Cornell University, said that if pets are not fed the correct balance of proteins, fats, minerals and vitamins, they can experience several health disorders, including anemia, broken bones and loss of teeth from lack of calcium.

Korinn Saker, a clinical nutritionist at the College of Veterinary Medicine at North Carolina State University, who treats animals at the school’s teaching hospital, said she was not against people cooking for their pets, but that if it was not done correctly, the consequences could be harmful.

She has seen several dogs with adverse effects from unbalanced homemade pet food diets, including a German shepherd puppy “who was walking on its elbows because it had no strength in its bones,” she said. The dog, it turned out, was not getting enough calcium.

Dr. Saker, asked to analyze the recipe from Ms. Laino’s workshop, found that it was lacking in a number of nutrients recommended by the Association of American Feed Control Officials.

Ms. Laino said she rejects the standards recommended by the feed association, and suggested that her recipe might be richer in certain nutrients because the ingredients are organic.

Hucksterism is alive and well for Barbara Laino and the N.Y. Times.