That's what I've been trying to tell you people. And you thought I was mad.
Posted on 09/08/2012 3:00:42 PM PDT by george76
Because of the importance of the US market, chocolate manufacturers in Switzerland are submitting to Uncle Sam’s intrusion in their factories but they are not happy about it.
“The fact that a foreign authority is involved in our Swiss businesses is unseemly,” Daniel Bloch, of Chocolats Camille Bloch, told Handelszeitung, the German-language business journal.
The newspaper has discovered that the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) plans to inspect 21 chocolate factories and 18 dairies in Switzerland.
The move is part of the implementation of America’s Food Safety Modernization Act, new legislation signed into law by President Barack Obama last year that aims, among other things, to combat bioterrorism.
...
the planned inspections appear to go well beyond health issues to include such details as sales, ownership, employees and the size of company buildings.
“We ask ourselves, what is the real reason for the FDA inspections
(Excerpt) Read more at thelocal.ch ...
I guess the community organizer has run out of American businesses to "shake down" for payoffs.
That harassment to Gibson guitars in Tennessee comes to mind.
The Swiss government should intervene to stop this now, and should have never tolerated it in the first place. Clearly, this has little or nothing to do with food safety, which means that something nefarious is going on.
By WTO rules, the US would have to prove that an imported product arriving in the US is unsafe before they could ban it. To demand inspection rights should raise red flags.
This is what happens when you hire lawyers to do food inspection instead of Sanitation/public health inspectors. The FDA is rancid with dishonest inspectors. I’d look real hard, there is some money going under the table somewhere. Look at the Senate Investigations of 1975 on fraud within the Army food inspectors, the USDA, and the APHIS.
The USPS for many years has had a presort verification auditor going up to Quebecor to verify processes they use to prepare mailings for the American market ~ if they pass that means the tens of millions of dollars in postage they pay in postage are being correctly computed (given the type, class, indicia and weight of the mail involved in a given mailing).
Come to think of it, as of late, the FDA and USDA seem to be obsessed with dairy products. The crackdown on the raw milk producers is just the tip of the iceberg to this.
Thinking beyond the pure authoritarian aspects of this, I wonder if something is going on that is frightening them?
The last “milk crisis” I’m aware of was when after nuclear atmospheric tests in Russia, because of the jet stream, suddenly Strontium-90 started pouring out of the sky onto middle America, where it showed up in cow’s milk.
The US immediately pushed for the atmospheric test ban treaty with the Soviet Union.
“The fact that a foreign authority is involved in our Swiss businesses is unseemly,” Daniel Bloch, of Chocolats Camille Bloch...”
It sounds like the inspection process/placement of American inspectors was unbeknownst to the owner (?) of the Swiss company as well.
That's what I've been trying to tell you people. And you thought I was mad.
Who’s questioning Swiss chocolate standards? Some guys in Hershey PA or from Mars?
Believe it or don’t but I do it all the time. Foreign governments routinely inspect stuff before shipment
I take it these inspections will occur just prior to/after the election, say, Octoberfest? Christmas shopping season?
Global World sneaking up.
ROFL
Let's say Switzerland says the ingredients must be heated to 100 degrees C for 10 minutes ~ and an entry was placed in the data base ~ how do you know the data entry personnel were trained and the computers were capable of properly recording the entry.
This stuff is just basic quality control ~ everybody does it ~ and the cheapest way to insert quality control for processed food and food byproducts is AT THE FACTORY. Downstream validation where you pull a candy bar and eat it is rather expensive compared to this more modern approach.
Wonder what the African cocoa growers think of Herr Block’s agents wandering around the cocoa groves checking on the quality of the trees?
The good news is that you can buy Dutch processed cocao in bulk and make your own confections with American milk.
The Swiss have every right to be upset. This is not the first intrusion by US authorities. That was in the area of bank accounts held by US Persons.
Big and Bigger government knows no bounds until something stops it. As a US citizen, I am embarrassed at the actions of my government. We would rebuke the Swiss if they sought to extend Swiss law to any US business activity. Fair is fair. US law must stop at the water’s edge.
As long as there are muzzies in The Schweiz, I’m down with inspections.
Yep. Just went through the poison dog food a month ago. I asked my niece to pick up food for Rosie, my rottie/shepherd mix. She got some off-brand and Rose got sick,she did not want to move. The crap is still in the stores. I fill containers with the food, so my niece did it for me, then threw away the bag. I really wanted the bag, so I could go after these bustards.
I remember being in Norway and buying a chocolate bar at a corner store for the equivalent of a quarter and thinking it was the most amazing piece of chocolate I had ever eaten. It didn't have that sugar and wax taste that most American "chocolate" has.
Now, Obama knows more about chocolate than the Swiss!
Is there anything he can’t do?!
/s
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