Law Commons^™

Food Court, Jason J. Czarnezki

Elisabeth Haub School of Law Faculty Publications

This article, focusing on produce and grain, discusses the environmental and climate change impacts of food production, processing, packaging, and distribution, which ultimately contribute to both economic and social costs. The article addresses environmental energy costs in the food supply. Figure 1 shows, for example, the significant amount of energy used in various aspects of food production, transportation, and processing.

Much of this article's focus will be on commodity crops. Along with wheat and rice, corn and soybeans constitute the world's most popular planted and consumed crops. The United States is the leading producer of corn, growing nearly 40 percent …

Fda And The Rise Of The Empowered Consumer, Lewis Grossman

Articles in Law Reviews & Other Academic Journals

This Article traces the still-evolving view of consumers of FDA-regulated products as capable, rational, and rights-bearing decision makers. It also examines the corresponding diminution of FDA’s role as a paternalistic gatekeeper collaborating with medical and scientific experts to prevent products and manufacturer-provided information from reaching the public. Compared with their 1960s counterparts, today’s consumers of food and drugs have far greater freedom to make unmediated choices among a wider variety of products, guided by a relative deluge of labeling and advertising information. Moreover, food and drug regulation, once the exclusive domain of bureaucrats and experts, has become a focus of …

From “Food Miles” To “Moneyball”: How We Should Be Thinking About Food And Climate, Bret C. Birdsong

Scholarly Works

Since Michael Pollan popularized the push to eat local food in his bestseller, The Omnivore’s Dilemma, the concept of “food miles” has been something of a rallying cry and an organizing principle in the marketing of the local food movement. Among locavores and their sympathizers, the term seems to encapsulate all that is wrong with the food system. Fresh grapes from Chile make their way to supermarkets from Maine to Minnesota, and even California. Major food conglomerates process commodity ingredients like corn, soy, and wheat into packaged food that travels across the country and across oceans before landing on …

Do You Know What's On Your Plate?: The Importance Of Regulating The Processes Of Food Production, Martha Dragich

Faculty Publications

This article argues that the current regulatory approach-focusing on the supposed equivalence of new foods to traditional ones-is unduly narrow, particularly given the characteristics of the modem food system. To achieve the broad objectives of the FDCA in the context of the industrialized, highly processed, and global food supply of the twenty-first century requires adopting a broader understanding of consumer protection needs with respect to food. The FDCA itself is written in very broad terms and provides much of the authority needed today. The FDA's enforcement capacity, however, already is severely strained.52 Moreover, the scientific basis for some process- oriented …