Saying consumers should not be misled, the Agriculture Department wants to change the definition of fresh chicken and turkeys to exclude any birds chilled below 26 degrees.
Instead, the chicken would have to be labeled as "previously frozen." At the same time, the department said the impact on the poultry industry would be minimal and some producers of fresh birds could profit.The proposal would reverse a policy of letting birds that have been frozen to an internal temperature of nearly zero be considered fresh. The department took a new look at the rules last year following a consumer outcry and a failed attempt by California to rewrite the rules.
Although water freezes at 32 degrees, chickens and turkeys start freezing at about 28 degrees because of naturally occurring minerals and other substances in the animals.
The Food Safety and Inspection Service "is proposing such action to ensure that poultry products distributed to consumers are not labeled in a false or misleading manner," the proposed rule says.
"Consumers would not be led to pay a higher price for products that have been previously frozen," the department said. But producers of truly fresh chicken could profit "if a price differential should develop between fresh and previously frozen chicken."
The public will be able to comment on the rule for 60 days before final regulations are written.
The poultry industry, based largely in the Southeast, said few birds ever got that cold. But the long-haul shipping across deserts and the uneven refrigeration in trucks often caused some of the birds to fall below 26 degrees.
The industry also said that colder chicken lasts longer by permitting fewer bacteria that cause spoilage to grow, and suggested in earlier comments that retail stores have no bar against freezing the product.
But the arguments carried no weight against several publicity tricks in which celebrity chefs like Wolfgang Puck testified before Congress, people used frozen broilers as bowling balls, and consumer groups allied with the California poultry industry, which had a business interested in restricting poultry from other states.