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IDFA Expresses Concern on USDA Product Specs (Dairy 6) IDFA submitted extensive comments last week to the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) regarding a draft document, called "Dairy 6," which describes requirements and product specifications for government purchases of cheddar cheese, butter and nonfat dry milk. These same criteria are used by some private buyers of these products and serve as the criteria for processors offering these products on the Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME). Dairy 6, which is a revision of the current "Dairy 5" version, was developed by USDA's Farm Service Agency.IDFA Senior Director Allen Sayler stated, "IDFA has several serious concerns with Dairy 6, and has worked closely with members to share comments that we hope will result in purchasing specifications that more closely reflect commercial practices." While IDFA supports updating the current dairy product purchasing requirements, it expressed significant concerns to USDA on a number of issues in the proposed Dairy 6 document. In particular, IDFA believes that the draft document, if approved without changes, would mandate unnecessary pathogen end product testing, unjustified lowering of product delivery temperatures, vague product specifications, difficult sampling criteria, and inflexible lot size specifications that do not recognize common commercial lot sizes. To view IDFA's full comments, click here. (.pdf) IDFA will be monitoring USDA's process on Dairy 6, with finalization expected sometime this fall. For more information, contact Allen Sayler at (202) 220-3544 or asayler@idfa.org.
Posted July 6, 2004
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