On April 18th, 2017, President Donald Trump signed Executive Order #13788 into effect reinforcing the Buy American Act and requiring the US government to start implementing more ‘Buy American and Hire American’ policies with additional scrutiny. This not only affects manufacturers/vendors that sell to the US government, but also farmers that supply produce to school districts, government facilities, and more. More specifically, the USDA’s School Lunch program must now comply with the recently signed EO by discontinuing waivers and preferring procurement from US Farmers.
With EO #13788 following its scheduled timeline, there is increasing pressure for the U.S. Government to implement more scrutinized procurement policies regarding the Buy American Act (BAA). Luckily, there is an easy solution for farmers to proactively meet and exceed increased procurement regulations.
Protect your Marijuana Strain and Brand using Blockchain and (UPC) Universal Product Code.
With Marijuana listed as a Schedule 1 drug in the United States, business owners and growers face strict Federal restrictions. These governmental commerce restrictions pose issues to brand owners and growers wishing to protect their personal Marijuana brands (strains) with trademarks Albeit, some states have begun adopting their own policies regarding Marijuana commerce and trade, the United States Patent and Trade Office (USPTO) presumes ultimate control in distributing trademarks and brand protection. A trademark is a word, phrase, symbol, or design, or combination of words, phrases, symbols, or designs, that identifies and distinguishes the source of goods of one party from those of others1. Ultimately, a trademark offers an incredible value-add to brand owners using a brand name that is recognized by consumers which therefore drives customers to their business. Business owners/growers seeking to protect their personalized crops or bring legitimacy to commonly known strains face issues in providing customers with strain and crop assurance due to these strict regulations on Marijuana commerce.Read more of this post
Nearly eight months after President Donald J. Trump signed his executive order “Buy American and Hire American,” an expert on certifying whether goods are made in the United States shared with Big League Politics the challenges in certification and enforcing Trump’s intentions.
Adam Reiser, the CEO and founder of Certified, Inc., told Big League Politics he is seeing no action in the executive branch to move the president’s executive order forward.
A source familiar with how the White House drafted the executive order told Big League Politics: “There are zero teeth in it, you know? Let’s of fanfare, lots of publicity, back-slapping and hand-shaking with Trump–and now, it is getting resisted, like as if it meant nothing.”
According to the president’s directive, all agencies were supposed to have turned into both the Department of Commerce and the Office of Management and Budget how they plan to comply. These plans are to include, searchable databases of certified vendors, storage arrangements for the documents and simplifications of their internal procurement procedures.
Reiser said Trump’s executive order was the president’s attempt to bring federal procurement back in synch with the law.
Byrne’s idea was that given support by the Hearst newspapers and by Hoover’s Commissioner of Customs Francis F.A. Eble, who would go on to start the Buy American Club.
“The law says that the U.S. government has to show preferential treatment to U.S. manufacturers,” Reiser said. “It is so the government has to buy from its own.”
Reiser said that from the 1970s, the federal government has been providing waivers to the 1933 law. “In the 1980s and 1990s, it has picked up big-time.”
President Donald J. Trump holding his Executive Order 13788 at the April 18, 2017 Kenosha, Wis., signing ceremony. (White House photo)
A senior administration official speaking on background on Easter Monday, the day before the executive order was signed in the headquarters of the tool company Snap-On in Kenosha, Wisconsin, said the executive order would correct the abuse of the Buy American Act waiver process.
“Okay, so the culture immediately changes across the agencies. We have a lax enforcement, lax monitoring, lax compliance,” the official said. Read more of this post
The auto industry has warned that significant changes to the so-called rules of origin could undercut the president’s America-first goals.
Top executives from Detroit automakers met Monday with Vice President Mike Pence and other administration officials and aired their concerns about changes the Trump administration is seeking to the North American Free Trade Agreement.
Trump has pushed for companies to construct more auto assembly plants in the U.S., while also pushing for major changes to NAFTA that the automakers oppose. U.S. negotiators have proposed significant changes to the so-called rules of origin for autos in a bid to ensure more U.S.-made parts are used in vehicles assembled in North America, a change that the auto industry has warned could undercut Trump’s America-first goals.
“We view the modernization of NAFTA as an important opportunity to update the 23-year-old agreement and set the stage for an expansion of U.S. auto exports,” Matt Blunt, a former Missouri governor who leads the American Automotive Policy Council, a trade association representing Ford Motor Co., General Motors Co., and Fiat Chrysler Automobiles NV said in a statement. “We also appreciate the opportunity to directly address the industry’s concerns with the administration’s rule of origin proposal.”
Blunt said there are other things the group would like to have added to NAFTA, including a provision to guard against currency manipulation by Mexico and Canada.
Fiat Chrysler Chief Executive Officer Sergio Marchionne, GM CEO Mary Barra and Joe Hinrichs, Ford’s president of global operations, attended the White House meeting. U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer and National Economic Council Director Gary Cohn were also scheduled to attend the meeting, Pence’s office said earlier on Monday.
Pence’s office issued a statement confirming the meeting and saying he emphasized “Trump’s commitment to enact historic tax cuts” and commitment to grow manufacturing in the U.S., reduce trade deficits and aid the car-making industry.
More Transportation Security Administration uniforms have been made in Mexico in recent years than in the United States, despite rules requiring the Department of Homeland Security to “buy American.”CreditDavid Mcnew/Getty Images
WASHINGTON — President Trump’s push to “buy American” has been a key initiative of his administration, and Mr. Trump speaks frequently about ensuring that the federal government is buying American products.
So it might come as a surprise that the uniforms of those Secret Service agents that protect and surround him every day are probably made outside the United States, most likely in Mexico.
The United States government has several laws on the books that require the military and other national security agencies to buy from American sources, when possible. But a new report from the Government Accountability Office shows how a primary rule covering the Department of Homeland Security, called the Kissell Amendment, has been undercut by a slew of bureaucratic restrictions and obligations required by international trade agreements.
As a result, over roughly the past three years, more Secret Service uniforms have been made in Mexico than in any other country — including the United States. The same goes for uniforms procured for Transportation Security Administration workers. The majority of uniforms for Customs and Border Protection and Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents are also made outside the United States, in countries like El Salvador, Honduras, Mexico and Cambodia.
“It really doesn’t have much impact at all,” Kimberly Gianopoulos, the director of the Government Accountability Office’s international affairs and trade team, said of the Kissell Amendment.
Certified organic strawberries aren’t so organic after all. Although organic strawberries sell for 50% to 100% more than conventional berries, organic strawberries are fumigated with toxic chemicals, including methyl bromide, at the beginning stages of their life-cycle.
Methyl bromide, is used to sterilize the soil before strawberries are planted. It’s not sprayed on the fruit. It’s a soil fumigant that kills just about everything it touches. Many hybridized seed varieties have been created that can only grow in sterile soil.
“The soil is, as a matter of fact, full of live organisms. It is essential to conceive of it as something pulsating with life, not as a dead or inert mass.”
– Albert Howard, The Soil and Health, 1947
“For most of agriculture’s 10,000-year history, farmers have succeeded or failed based on their ability to nurture life within soil. The microorganisms and earthworms that thrive in healthy soil metabolize nutrients and make them available for crops. They also convert animal and vegetable waste into humus, thus regenerating their own habitat and maintaining that thin layer of topsoil on which all terrestrial life depends.
In modern agriculture, however, soil operates as a medium, not a habitat: It exists to transfer synthetic, pre-metabolized nutrients from factories to crops. In this regime, any life form found in soil is at best innocuous — and at worst a threat. When a vast field is planted in the same crop year after year, its pests concentrate in the soil, waiting to strike.”
Do you want to know where your things come from?
Download our app it’s still in BETA but you can help build it the name of the App is Verity Scanning Apple Android
Nowadays, more and more people are becoming aware of the fact that many of the foods we consume daily have been imported from China.
These are the some of the current most dangerous foods imported in China we consume daily:
1. Apple Juice
China is well known to use dangerous pesticides in the production of foods, including banned pesticides. Also, nearly 50% of all apple juice sold in the United States is imported from China.
2. Industrial Salt
The Chinese often use salt produced for industrial purposes as table salt, so there are high chances that we often consume industrial salt as well, which can lead to high stroke and heart attack risk, high blood pressure, and hypertension.
3. Cod Fish
Half of the American Cod is imported from China, and you have probably already heard about the water pollution and feeding issue with this fish in China.
4. Chicken
China often has issues with avian flu and other foodborne illnesses, and in 2013, the US Department of Agriculture approved the sale of Chinese chicken in America. However, research has also shown that the chicken there are fed and kept in disastrous conditions.
5. Chinese Garlic
31% of the garlic we use is imported from China, and Chinese use tons of harmful pesticides in the production of these foods, especially methyl bromide.
6. Tilapia Fish
Furthermore, 80% of the tilapia sold in the United States is also Chinese. The tilapia fish is a bottom feeder, meaning that I consume all it can find. Yet, if we consider the water pollution, we can state that the consumption of anything raised in that water would be not just unsafe, but extremely dangerous.
7. Plastic Rice
It has also been reported that China also produces fake, plastic rice. This rice is made of resin and potatoes and stays hard when boiled.
We believe that these facts above surely made you think that it is always better to stay on the safe side and buy and consume local, organic foods.
The agriculture ministry said in an online statement that China had suspended imports of meat from Brazil in health scare (AFP Photo/Miguel SCHINCARIOL)
Brasília (AFP) – The fallout from Brazil’s rotten meat scandal accelerated on Monday when China, a huge client, suspended imports and the European Union demanded a partial ban.
Another ban on Brazilian meat imposed by Chile sparked fears of a trade spat between the two South American partners.
A charm offensive by President Michel Temer, who even invited foreign ambassadors to a traditional meat restaurant in the capital Brasilia late Sunday, failed to calm importers.
China, which with Hong Kong is Brazil’s biggest meat export market, said it needed to know more about the allegations that major meatpacking businesses bribed inspectors to get health certificates and masked tainted meat as fit for consumption.
A peanut butter substitute sold by an Illinois company is being recalled because 12 cases of E. coli have been linked to the product.
Glenview-based I.M. Health SoyNut Butter Co . is voluntarily recalling its SoyNut Butter products.
E. coli cases in Arizona, California, Maryland, New Jersey and Oregon have been linked to the nut-free product
iStock
Illinois public health Director Dr. Nirav Shah says some E. coli infections are mild but others may be life-threatening. Young children are particularly vulnerable.
Health officials recommend people not eat any variety or size of I.M. Healthy-brand SoyNut Butter products or granola coated with the company’s SoyNut Butter.
Hold the nachos. Sargento just recalled seven of its cheeses for a potential listeria contamination. An outbreak at one of its suppliers affected shredded and sliced varieties, including colby, jack and taco cheese.
Both the Ultra Thin Sliced Longhorn Colby and Chef Blends Shredded Nacho & Taco Cheese are possibly contaminated. Eating food with listeria can cause a serious infection, with symptoms like fever, muscle aches and gastrointestinal problems. According to the CDC, about 260 people die of listeriosis every year. Pregnant women, newborns and the elderly are especially vulnerable. So far, no known illnesses are associated with this recall.
Out of “an abundance of caution,” Sargento also recalled five more products packaged at the same facility. Cheese lovers should throw out: Sliced Colby-Jack Cheese, Sliced Pepper Jack Cheese, Chef Blends Shredded Taco Cheese, Off The Block Shredded Fine Cut Colby-Jack Cheese and Off The Block Shredded Fine Cut Cheddar Jack Cheese. For more information, including the affected UPC numbers and sell by dates, check Sargento’s website or call 1-800-CHEESES.
The supplier, Deustch Kase Haus in Middlebury, Indiana, makes cheese for other stores as well. Meijer is recalling its Meijer Brand Colby Cheese and Colby Jack Cheese, which was sold at deli counters between November 10 and February 9. Shoppers are encouraged throw it away or return it for a full refund.
Cheese from Sara Lee and Amish Classics as well as salads from Taylor Farms have also been affected, so double-check your lunch before chowing down.
Nearly eight months after President Donald J. Trump signed his executive order “
