Dive Brief:
- The House Appropriations Committee OK'd its version of the USDA's 2017 budget and with it included a report that requested that USDA ensures that checkoff programs are protected from the Freedom of Information Act.
- The argument is that these checkoff programs are privately funded and therefore should not be subjected to FOIA. FOIA was recently invoked to demand that the American Egg Board turn over its emails in an investigation regarding Hampton Creek and its Just Mayo eggless mayonnaise.
- However, even if the bill becomes law, the courts could challenge the report's language.
Dive Insight:
If this bill is passed with the report's language intact, AEB and other checkoff programs would no longer be subjected to the FOIA requests. This means activities and communications could go undiscovered unless the USDA launches its own investigation.
The industry groups, such as American Egg Board, "very much want to have it both ways," Parke Wilde, a Tufts University food policy specialist and long-time critic of the checkoff programs, told NPR.
On the one hand, in 2005, these groups went before the Supreme Court to argue that checkoff programs were "government speech." This forced farmers to pay into the programs, even if they didn't want to participate.
But now that FOIA is putting these industry groups' emails and other documents at risk of public discovery, the groups are emphasizing that they are actually private, because they receive no direct government funding.
The isssue arose after the Associated Press requested emails from the American Egg Board, which led to controversy between the egg industry group and Hampton Creek. Emails revelaed that AEB tried to stop sales of Just Mayo at Whole Foods, among other controversial activities. AEB CEO Joanne Ivy stepped down, and the USDA launched an investigation.