Given the number of operations that handle both potatoes and onions, a move by the USDA involving spuds could have significant impact.
An April 11 press release from the office of Rep. Chellie Pingree (D-Maine) outlines a bipartisan congressional effort to “express opposition to efforts to declassify potatoes as vegetables.”
The full release and letter to the USDA are accessible at https://pingree.house.gov/news/documentsingle.aspx?DocumentID=5221 .
Pingree, a member of the House Agriculture Committee, is joined by Rep. Mike Simpson (R-Idaho) in opposition to the measure to reclassify potatoes as a grain.
The release said, “In a letter to U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) Secretary Thomas Vilsack and U.S. Department of Health & Human Services (DHHS) Secretary Xavier Becerra, Pingree, Simpson, and 27 Members of Congress voiced their strong opposition to any reclassification of potatoes, which they say would “call the scientific credibility of the entire process into question.”
“Since the inception of the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), it has classified potatoes correctly as a vegetable. There is no debate about the physical characteristics of the potato and its horticultural scientific classification. Given the nutritional value of potatoes, consumers would be missing out on key nutrients if a reclassification effort, or even a suggestion that grains and potatoes are similar and thus interchangeable, moves forward through the DGAs process.
“Any change to potatoes’ current classification under the DGAs would immediately confuse consumers, retailers, restaurant operators, growers, and indeed the entire supply chain.”
The group also pointed out that reclassifying potatoes as a grain “would defy the scientific assertion made by the National Library of Medicine study,”
In addition to Pingree and Simpson, the letter was signed by House Agriculture Committee Chair Glenn “G.T.” Thompson (R-Pa.), and Representatives Jared Golden (D-Maine), Shri Thanedar (D-Mich.), Dan Meuser (R-Pa.), Tom Tiffany (R-Wisc.), Elissa Slotkin (D-Mich.), Cathy McMorris Rodgers (R-Wash.), Jack Bergman (R-Mich.), Dan Newhouse (R-Wash.), Kelly Armstrong (R-N.D.), Scott Fitzgerald (R-Wisc.), Derrick Van Orden (R-Wisc.), Lisa C. McClain (R-Mich.), John R. Moolenaar (R-Mich.), Mike Gallagher (R-Wisc.), Bill Huizenga (R-Mich.), Russ Fulcher (R-Idaho), Kim Schrier (D-Wash.), Lori Chavez-DeRemer (R-Ore.), Marcus Molinaro (R-N.Y.), Claudia Tenney (R-N.Y.), Andrea Salinas (D-Ore.), Cliff Bentz (R-Ore.), Dan Kildee (D-Mich.), Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.), Rick Larsen (D-Wash.), and Suzan DelBene (D-Wash).
