CPI’s new website goes live!

Check it out at http://www.publicintegrity.org
While you’re there, be sure to visit our new website tutorial…created by yours truly. Enjoy!

How multimedia unites

We’re closer than we think.

Props to my husband

I know I’m supposed to be busy promoting my work on this site, but I can’t resist doing a little PR for my husband, Arya Surowidjojo, who just co-produced a video for Vanity Fair’s website! Check it out at http://www.vanityfair.com/ontheweb/blogs/daily/2008/04/capital-convers.html.

FDA looks abroad to increase food safety

By ARIEL OLSON SUROWIDJOJO
Observer Staff
April 2, 2008

Poisoned toothpaste, toxic fish and contaminated pet food are just some of the products that raised food safety concerns in the United States last year. All of the items, or certain ingredients, were imported from China—a nation that has commanded the attention of food regulatory commissions worldwide, as it struggles to sufficiently monitor its rapidly growing exports. In March, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration announced plans to establish several permanent offices in the People’s Republic by 2009, pending China’s authorization.

FDA press officer Stephanie Kwisnek said the foreign posts are just one step in the process of addressing concerns for the safety of U.S. imported foods. She also indicated that the agency plans to increase its overall presence abroad by “build[ing] capacity at foreign sites in at least five regions, beginning with China.”

“The permanent overseas offices in China will also allow greater access for inspections and greater interactions with manufacturers to help assure that FDA-regulated products—food, drugs, medical devices and cosmetics—that are shipped to the United States meet U.S. standards for safety [and] manufacturing quality,” Kwisnek said by e-mail.

In recent years, cheap labor and lax environmental and safety regulations have attracted scores of foreign manufacturers to China’s shores. While machinery, office equipment and textiles remain among the nation’s top exports, the exportation of food and food ingredients, particularly to the United States, has increased dramatically.

Last year alone the United States imported more than $4.9 billion of fish and agricultural products from China. According to U.S. Census trade data, that is more than twice the amount of food imported from the country just four years earlier.

But as the demand for food imports continues to rise; the FDA’s capacity to inspect these deliveries has been drastically reduced. According to the census, combined food and forestry imports have increased by 39 percent since 2003. Although the agency’s inspectors still review 100 percent of all entry documentation, they physically inspect less than 1 percent of all imported products, according to the FDA.

William Hubbard, a spokesman for the Coalition for a Stronger FDA and a former senior associate commissioner for policy for the agency, said the FDA simply doesn’t have enough staff to keep up with the deluge of imports.

“The growth in imported food in the United States has skyrocketed,” Hubbard said in an interview last fall. “Our paradigm needs to shift from putting all the responsibility on the FDA, at the border, to inspect when food arrives here, to putting more responsibility on the exporters in China, or wherever, to inspect the food before it’s ever put on the boat.”

On March 14 of this year the FDA announced a plan to accomplish that goal. The proposal, which has yet to be approved by Chinese authorities, would establish eight permanent, full-time FDA positions at U.S. diplomatic posts throughout China, including the U.S. Embassy in Beijing and the U.S. Consulates General in Shanghai and Guangzhou. As part of the FDA’s “Beyond Borders” initiative, the plan aims to enhance the agency’s ability to communicate directly with Chinese manufacturers and to increase inspection of their facilities.

“In an age when a border is not a barrier, the globalized economy demands nothing less that heightened regulatory interoperability, information exchange, and cooperation, especially on product quality and enforcement matters,” said the FDA’s Murray Lumpkin, deputy commissioner for International and Special Programs, in a press release. “Our efforts to fill permanent FDA positions in China are a significant step toward ensuring access to safe food, drugs, and medical devices in the global market.”

The FDA said it plans to fill the positions, and hire five additional Chinese nationals to work with U.S. employees, over the next 18 months. But according to Chris Waldrop, director of the Food Policy Institute at the Consumer Federation of America, the new plan won’t necessarily lead directly to an increase in food safety. Waldrop said the FDA also needs to take further action to establish food safety standards, to increase regulation of Chinese exports and to verify that imported foods are safe for consumers.

“Just putting people on the ground in China isn’t going to solve the problem,” Waldrop said. “You need to have the full buy-in of the Chinese government and their inspection system regulating that the food will be safe.”

Although Chinese authorities have not officially approved the new plan, Wang Baodong, press counselor and spokesperson for the Chinese Embassy in Washington, expressed receptivity to the proposal.

“China is always ready to be engaged in enhancing dialogue and cooperation with the U.S. in dealing with product quality and food safety,” Baodong said by e-mail. “Such communication and cooperation are beneficial to both sides.”

The establishment of FDA offices in China is not the agency’s first attempt to prevent substandard exports from reaching the United States. Each year the organization conducts roughly 1,000 inspections of foreign facilities, provides training for its regulatory counterparts abroad, and advocates for higher international food and product safety standards. The agency has also negotiated more than 50 Memoranda of Understanding (MOUs), which require foreign exporters to ensure that their U.S.-bound products meet FDA standards before they are shipped.

Despite these precautions, products coming from China continued to pose health and safety risks to U.S. consumers throughout 2007. Last March, the FDA warned pet owners to avoid pet food produced by Menu Foods, Inc. after the Canadian manufacturer found contaminated wheat gluten in several of its products. The gluten, which was imported from China, was believed to contain melamine, a chemical commonly used in fertilizers and fire retardants. Hundreds of pets died of kidney failure after eating the tainted food.

In May the FDA announced the recall of a Chinese product labeled as monkfish, which was believed to contain tetrodotoxin—a harmful neurotoxin that cannot be removed by cooking or freezing. And in October, the agency cautioned consumers to avoid purchasing toothpaste labeled “Made in China” after several countries, including Panama, found traces of a poisonous chemical called diethylene glycol in toothpastes and cough syrups traced back to the Asian nation. Many non-food products were recalled as well because they threatened consumer safety; including toy trains, baby carriers, air pumps, fans, electric heaters, computer batteries and other products.

“China attached great importance to the defect[ive] products exported overseas, and [has] taken resolute actions to improve the quality and safety of its exports, particularly toys, food and drugs,” Baodong said.

Last April, China executed a former head of its food and drug regulatory agency after he was found guilty of accepting bribes to approve an unsafe antibiotic, which resulted in at least 10 deaths.

Last year’s massive recalls prompted FDA officials to refocus their domestic inspection efforts on a variety of Chinese products, as they arrive at more than 150 U.S. ports of entry each day. Since March 2007, the agency has refused nearly 1,900 shipments originating in China, more than any other country. India and Mexico followed in the number of shipments rejected, with 1,800 and 1,780 respectively, according to information gathered from the FDA’s Web site.

But the number of products refused by U.S. inspectors comprises only a fraction of the large quantity of goods that China exports to the United States each year, according to Baodong.

“Generally speaking, China’s exports to the U.S. have been enjoying [a] very high rate of qualification,” he said. “Over 99 percent of all the exports to the U.S. were up to the standard for the last three years.”

Experts say the reason China continues to top the FDA’s refusal list is the rapid rate at which its manufacturing industry has grown in recent years. According to the latest WTO report, the country’s exports grew by 27 percent in 2006, compared to the United States’ 15 percent growth rate. By the year’s end, China replaced the United States as the world’s second leading exporter behind Germany, which it is also expected to surpass in 2008.

“China is becoming a major player on the market in a very quick and rapid fashion without the chance to gradually work their way up to that place,” Waldrop said.

The country’s decentralized government also poses a challenge to the effective enforcement of food and product safety standards. Waldrop said it is common for regional and city government officials to interpret regulations differently and to implement standards in different ways.

“All these different levels of government bureaucracy make it more difficult to oversee the entire country,” Waldrop said.

In December of 2007, after six months of negotiations, China signed a memorandum of understanding requiring manufacturers to register with Chinese authorities. According to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, the agreement would also increase information sharing, quality-assurance and tracking of all exports. The memorandum, along with an increased FDA presence in abroad and a number of new bills targeting import safety, may signal a significant breakthrough in managing the growing flood of Chinese imports and restoring consumer confidence.

“I believe that positive results will be achieved through bilateral consultations on an equal footing,” Baodong said

Almost famous

Thanks to the WashingtonPost.com for providing me with a truly awesome clip for my portfolio. Check it out below or by clicking here.

“Election Sparks Interest in Politics Among Younger Voters”
By Cristina Fernandez-Pereda and Ariel Olson Surowidjojo
Special to washingtonpost.com
Monday, March 3, 2008; 9:00 AM

Historically, they’ve been seen as liberal, Democratic, anti-war and seemingly too young to be concerned about the state of the national economy. But though this generation’s most defining factor has been that their voter turnout made them appear to be either too apathetic or too turned off by politics to vote, in recent elections younger voters have become more engaged in the political process.

Today, with a newly energized young electorate, more young voters are exercising their right to vote. Youth voter turnout in 2008 has doubled, tripled and even quadrupled in some primary states compared to their levels in 2004. In Democratic primaries, young people have gone from being 9 percent of all voters four years ago to 14 percent of voters this year.

And, while the presidential candidates point out the changes they will make if elected, young voters are signaling a change of their own. With the crucial Ohio and Texas primaries just a day away, economic concerns have surpassed the war in Iraq as a hot-button issue among young voters.

“The growing cost of college is directly affecting the average student and forcing them to graduate hundreds of thousands dollars in debt,” said Rachael Monnin, a student at American University, who said she plans to vote in Ohio. “Instead of the fresh, bright, boundless future we’re told about in high school, we’re forced to worry about enormous loans and the necessity of a job lined up immediately after graduation.”

In online interviews with 128 young people in four battleground states – Florida, Ohio, Colorado and Virginia – more than 67 percent of the respondents identified the economy as a very important voting issue in the 2008 presidential election. The war in Iraq followed second, with 64 percent. Young people also were very concerned about health care, with 46 percent of respondents saying health care is a very important issue in the presidential campaign. The fourth most important issue, according to young voters, was the environment, with 37 percent ranking it as a very important issue. The online survey was conducted from Feb. 15 to Feb. 22 by graduate journalism students at American University in Washington, D.C.

“For my generation, which will be moving into the workforce in the next 5-to-10 years, buying houses, paying taxes and eventually need[ing] social security; I believe a bad economy will have the greatest effect on our livelihood,” said Cory Hawkins, a freshman at Eckerd College in Florida.

Nearly half of the young people surveyed said that they do not think they will be able to afford to buy a home in the next five years, and 61 percent of young voters said that politicians are not paying enough attention to economic issues facing young voters. Many said that politicians should be paying more attention to student debt and student loans, the high cost of tuition and the economy overall. But young voters are also thinking about tax rates, foreign debt and the war in Iraq.

“The next administration will be burdened with an outrageous deficit that we need to turn around in order to improve the job market, housing and return interest rates to equilibrium,” said Shannon Hopkins, a senior from Ohio Wesleyan University. “Balancing our country’s economy is essential to support the social programs that each candidate has set forth.”

While 51 percent of those surveyed said they had approximately the same level of concern about the war in Iraq now as they did a year ago, many linked Iraq directly to their growing apprehension about the economy.

Lawrence Murphy, a junior at Florida State University, said the U.S. economy “is being sucked dry by the war. … This one issue affects almost every other important issue facing our country right now.”

According to the survey, health care is another area of concern for many young voters.

“Health care is something everyone should have and not have to worry about,” said Heem Mehmood, a freshman at Virginia Tech. “It’s ridiculous that today nearly 50 million Americans are without health care and dying because of it when we are the wealthiest and most developed country in the world.”

Reflecting an upsurge in young voters’engagement with Campaign 2008, all the young people interviewed said they were registered to vote or plan to register to vote before November. Nearly 97 percent of the respondents said they plan to vote in the general election, and many reported that they already had voted or were planning to vote in a primary or caucus. More than 90 percent of the respondents said that they expect their generation will have either some influence or a lot of influence in deciding who will be the next president.

When asked to volunteer the name of the candidate they would vote for if the presidential election were held today, Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) got the most votes among the survey’s respondents, drawing 54 percent. Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.)., came in second, with 19 percent of the respondents choosing him. Sen. Hillary Clinton (D-N.Y.), came in third, with 10 percent of the respondents selecting her as their candidate of choice. Reflecting trends so far in voting among young people in primaries, Obama was the choice of both young men and young women voters, although several respondents expressed admiration for Clinton as the first woman with a serious shot at the presidency.

More than 80 percent of those surveyed said young voters seem to be more involved in this presidential election than during past election cycles, and they cited both the excitement and importance of this election-and the increased role of Internet organizing-as factors in their engagement.

“There are more candidates who we can relate to this year than in past years,” said Scott Gluckstern, a senior at the University of Florida.

Editors: Amanda Knowles, Caitlin Lukacs, Joan Soley, Lisa Tanger, Jodi Westrick
Writers: Liz Anderson, Andras Gal, Eun Kang, Casey Labrack, Christina Fernandez-Pereda, Sakina Rangwala, Ariel Olson Surowidjojo, Adina Young
Reporters: Liz Anderson, Cristina Fernandez-Pereda, Caitlin Lukacs, Katherine Gypson, Casey Labrack, Eun Kang, Sakina Rangwala
Survey webmaster: Katharine Jarmul
Graphic: Jessica Kadylak
Researchers: Federica Narancio, Caine O’Rear, Federica Valabrega
Additional Research – The Undergraduate “Reporting” course at American University: Tara Abell, Jessica Arencibia, Cynammon Burns, Charlie Carroll, Lauren Cater, Thomas Feeney, Lyndsey Hall, Heather McAuliffe, Jessica McGarry, Rana Novini, Obaahemaa Nyanin, Shikole Struber, Meredith Veloz, Abigail Wihl, Melinda Wise, Laura Wolz

“Argonautika” ships Greek tragedy to the modern world

By ARIEL OLSON SUROWIDJOJO
Observer Staff
Feb. 20, 2008

The voyage of Jason and the Argonauts is an ancient tale, but Mary Zimmerman’s adaptation of the Greek myth is fresh, inventive and delightfully irreverent. In an imaginative fusion of modern comedy and classic drama, Zimmerman confidently recasts Jason’s legend in a pert new mold.

Performed by the Shakespeare Theatre Company, Argonautika — which plays through March 2 at the Lansburgh Theatre in Washington, D.C. — pays no homage to the assumption that Greek tragedy is dead.

Atley Loughridge as Medea and Jake Suffian as Jason in the Shakespeare Theatre Company’s production of Argonautika, written and directed by Mary Zimmerman. Photo by Carol Rosegg. Courtesy of the Shakespeare Theatre Company.

The adventure begins with Jason’s return to Iolcus, where his uncle Pelias has killed his father and usurped the throne. Fearing for his life, the “most handsome and adorable king,” played by Allen Gilmore, conspires to kill Jason by sending him on an impossible journey — to retrieve the legendary Golden Fleece stolen by King Aietes years ago. Under the protection of the goddesses Hera and Athena, Jason, played by Jake Suffian, and his company of intrepid Argonauts set out across the sea to reclaim their kingdom’s rightful treasure.

Any lingering doubts about Zimmerman’s originality are dispelled as soon as Jason’s courageous crew assembles for the “Shabooya roll call,” with each member rhyming his or her introduction to the audience to the jovial beat of drums. Soon after, ropes are hoisted and ladders and oars are set in place, converting the two-story wood-paneled set into a massive ship. The gallant Argonauts are on their way.

Hera and Athena, played by Lisa Tejero and Sofia Jean Gomez respectively, relate the epic journey. But these duplicitous deities lend much more than their narration to the performance. Their cheeky asides embellish the comedy on stage, and their mockery of the ill-fated explorers signals to the audience that in this contemporary account it’s all right to laugh at the Argonauts’ foolish bravado.

Lisa Tejero as Hera and Sofia Jean Gomez as Athena in the Shakespeare Theatre Company’s production of Argonautika, written and directed by Mary Zimmerman. Photo by Carol Rosegg. Courtesy of the Shakespeare Theatre Company.

The play’s creative puppetry and convincing sound design brings each of Jason’s foes to life. After battling a goofy-eyed sea monster, a giant boxer and a seductive river nymph, Jason and his Argonauts finally land in Colchis, modern-day Georgia. The goddesses watch from above as their hapless hero confronts Aietes, played by Søren Oliver, and requests the Golden Fleece. The king agrees, but not without posing yet another impossible challenge — Jason must yoke two fire-breathing bulls and sow cursed serpents’ teeth into the plowed earth. Naively, he agrees. What other choice does a hero have?

Sofia Jean Gomez as Athena and Lisa Tejero as Hera in the Shakespeare Theatre Company’s production of Argonautika, written and directed by Mary Zimmerman. Photo by Carol Rosegg. Courtesy of the Shakespeare Theatre Company.

In desperation, Hera and Athena turn to a convincingly air-headed Aphrodite, played by Tessa Klein, who agrees to persuade her renegade son to make Medea, Aietes’ sorceress daughter, fall in love with Jason. Summoned by his mother, Aros, played by Ronete Levenson, descends from the ceiling in a demon-red costume, snapping chewing gum and proclaiming, “Wazzup!”

As Jason agrees to Aietes’ challenge, Aros’ arrow pierces Medea through the heart in slow motion. Love struck, gored and dripping with blood, Medea giggles: “Something has gone wrong with me.”

In the end, the goddess’ scheming is successful. With Medea’s help Jason foils Aietes, retrieves the Golden Fleece and flees to temporary victory with Medea. The two consummate their love aboard the Argo during the high-speed chase that ensues.

“Oh yes they did,” Athena tells the audience. “Right there on the Fleece itself.”

Jason’s victory and his romance with Medea don’t last long. (It’s still a Greek tragedy after all.) But the brave Argonauts do find immortality, becoming the 12 zodiac constellations that adorn the heavens even today.

IF YOU GO…
Argonautika plays through March 2 at Washington’s Lansburgh Theatre
450 7th St. N.W. near the Gallery Place/China Town metro stop
Purchase tickets online or by calling the box office at (202) 547-1122