The economic forces driving the costs of food safety regulation

The cost of compliance with the Pathogen Reduction Hazard Analysis Critical Control Program (PR/HACCP) rule of 1996 has been controversial from the time it was first proposed. Recent survey evidence indicates costs of about $0.01 per pound. These estimates may capture actual costs but do not indicate how different components of the rule itself, such as HACCP tasks, and indirect influences, such as plant size, affect costs differently. The purpose of this paper is to empirically examine these direct and indirect influences. Preliminary results suggest that plant size has a small, if any influence on costs. The most substantial direct cost is the cost of performing sanitation and tasks associated with a plant's HACCP process control plan.Food Consumption/Nutrition/Food Safety,

MEAT AND POULTRY PLANTS' FOOD SAFETY INVESTMENTS: SURVEY FINDINGS

Results from the first national survey of the types and amounts of food safety investments made by meat and poultry slaughter and processing plants since the late 1990s provide evidence that market forces have worked in conjunction with regulation to promote the use of more sophisticated food safety technologies. From 1996 through 2000, U.S. plants as a group spent about $380 million annually and made$570 million in long-term investments to comply with USDA's 1996 Pathogen Reduction/Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Point (PR/HACCP) regulation, according to a survey initiated by the Economic Research Service. The U.S. meat and poultry industry as a whole during the same time period spent an additional $360 million on food safety investments that were not required by the PR/HACCP rule. Implementation of the regulation began in 1997 and was mandated by early 2000 in all sizes and types of meat and poultry slaughter and processing plants. The full HACCP surveys referenced in this technical bulletin are available at: http://www.ers.usda.gov/data/haccpsurveyFood Consumption/Nutrition/Food Safety, Livestock Production/Industries,

Actomyosin-based Self-organization of cell internalization during C. elegans gastrulation

Background: Gastrulation is a key transition in embryogenesis; it requires self-organized cellular coordination, which has to be both robust to allow efficient development and plastic to provide adaptability. Despite the conservation of gastrulation as a key event in Metazoan embryogenesis, the morphogenetic mechanisms of self-organization (how global order or coordination can arise from local interactions) are poorly understood. Results: We report a modular structure of cell internalization in Caenorhabditis elegans gastrulation that reveals mechanisms of self-organization. Cells that internalize during gastrulation show apical contractile flows, which are correlated with centripetal extensions from surrounding cells. These extensions converge to seal over the internalizing cells in the form of rosettes. This process represents a distinct mode of monolayer remodeling, with gradual extrusion of the internalizing cells and simultaneous tissue closure without an actin purse-string. We further report that this self-organizing module can adapt to severe topological alterations, providing evidence of scalability and plasticity of actomyosin-based patterning. Finally, we show that globally, the surface cell layer undergoes coplanar division to thin out and spread over the internalizing mass, which resembles epiboly. Conclusions: The combination of coplanar division-based spreading and recurrent local modules for piecemeal internalization constitutes a system-level solution of gradual volume rearrangement under spatial constraint. Our results suggest that the mode of C. elegans gastrulation can be unified with the general notions of monolayer remodeling and with distinct cellular mechanisms of actomyosin-based morphogenesis

Substance Use and Depression Symptomatology: Measurement Invariance of the Beck Depression Inventory (BDI-II) among Non-Users and Frequent-Users of Alcohol, Nicotine and Cannabis

Depression is a highly heterogeneous condition, and identifying how symptoms present in various groups may greatly increase our understanding of its etiology. Importantly, Major Depressive Disorder is strongly linked with Substance Use Disorders, which may ameliorate or exacerbate specific depression symptoms. It is therefore quite plausible that depression may present with different symptom profiles depending on an individual’s substance use status. Given these observations, it is important to examine the underlying construct of depression in groups of substance users compared to non-users. In this study we use a non-clinical sample to examine the measurement structure of the Beck Depression Inventory (BDI-II) in non-users and frequent-users of various substances. Specifically, measurement invariance was examined across those who do vs. do not use alcohol, nicotine, and cannabis. Results indicate strict factorial invariance across non-users and frequent-users of alcohol and cannabis, and metric invariance across non-users and frequent-users of nicotine. This implies that the factor structure of the BDI-II is similar across all substance use groups

U.S. tax aspects of doing business abroad;

https://egrove.olemiss.edu/aicpa_guides/1110/thumbnail.jp

Cost-Effective Management of Snake River Chinook Salmon: Response to Wilson et al.

Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/73669/1/j.1523-1739.2009.01171.x.pd

U.S. tax aspects of doing business abroad

4th ed., revhttps://egrove.olemiss.edu/aicpa_guides/1256/thumbnail.jp