@article{Lichtenberg:168210,
      recid = {168210},
      author = {Lichtenberg, Erik and Tselepidakis, Elina},
      title = {Prevalence and Cost of On-Farm Produce Safety Measures in  the Mid-Atlantic},
      address = {2014-05-09},
      number = {329-2016-13134},
      pages = {31},
      month = {May},
      year = {2014},
      abstract = {We use data from a survey of leafy greens and tomato  growers in the Mid-Atlantic region to investigate the  prevalence and cost of produce safety practices required  under the proposed Produce Rule implementing the Food  Safety Modernization Act.  Majorities of our respondents  currently employ most of the food safety practices that  would be required under the proposed Produce Rule.  But the  Produce Rule will nevertheless require changes on the part  of a large number of growers.  We find no evidence that the  use of any of these practices is correlated with farm size.   We do find some evidence that the shares of product sold  to grocery/retail and to restaurants are positively  correlated with the probability of testing water, soil  amendments or product, consistent with theoretical  literature suggesting that traceability increases  incentives to take precautionary measures.  We find that  all of these practices exhibit substantial increasing  returns to scale, implying that the burden of complying  with the provisions of the Produce Rule is much lower for  large operations than small ones.  Our estimates suggest in  addition that compliance costs are likely to be burdensome  only for a handful of practices, notably testing of soil  amendments, employee training, facility sanitation, and  sanitizing harvest containers; further, that burden is  likely to be much greater for small and very small  operations than for large ones.},
      url = {http://ageconsearch.umn.edu/record/168210},
      doi = {https://doi.org/10.22004/ag.econ.168210},
}