The Senate might get to the Food Safety Modernization Act as soon as tonight. Though I’m interested in the subject, I haven’t been able to spend much time looking into the bill. But Michael Pollan, author of the Omnivore’s Dilemma, has. His summary judgment? It would be “a tragedy” if it didn’t pass.

Ezra Klein: What’s your bottom line on this bill? Is it good? Bad?

Michael Pollan: It’s very interesting that the consumer groups and the people representing smaller producers and farmers have come together. It didn’t look like that was going to happen a few weeks ago. The bill as originally written basically treated all farms and food producers the same. It was one-size-fits-all regulation. This was a problem for smaller farmers and processors because the regulatory burden was going to make life difficult for them. They felt they weren’t the problem, and to suffer as part of the solution to the problem was an undue burden.

So Jon Tester, an organic farmer himself, came up with an amendment exempting producers according to three criteria. If you sold half of your food directly to consumers or retailers, had sales under $500,000, and sold within 400 miles of where you were producing, you’d be exempt from the provisions of the bill. The consumer groups didn’t like this because they felt there was a risk to food safety no matter the scale. The e coli outbreak a few years ago was a small producer feeding into a big wholesaler, for instance. So they came out against the amendment. And there were many small farmers willing to see the whole bill go down if the Tester amendment wasn’t there, which I think would’ve been a tragedy.