'Locavore' movement likely to spur food safety policies

The increasing popularity of buying locally produced foods directly from farmers is accompanied by a parallel rise in concerns about keeping local consumers safe from the same pathogens responsible for nationwide outbreaks of salmonella, listeria and E. coli, according to the second in a three-part MSNBC series about food safety.

According to the story, Richard Molinar, small farm program advisor for the University of California Cooperative Extension in Fresno County, thinks the local food movement will put pressure on local farms to develop food safety plans.

“Certainly more people are wanting to buy fresh and buy local; that doesn’t mean that they’re not concerned about food safety,” said Molinar, who helps small farmers develop scaled-down food safety manuals. “When you go to swap meets or farmers markets, I think at some point consumers are going to want to see or know if those farmers have some kind of policy in place.”

Richard Molinar, center, and his assistant Michael Yang, left, with a local farmer.

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