Meanwhile, congressmen from Alabama, Arkansas and Mississippi, the top three catfish-producing states, have been looking for ways to bolster the domestic industry by limiting imports. And eventually, critics say, they figured more inspectors might do the trick.

Seafood inspection is the job of the Food and Drug Administration, and that's one reason both McCain and the Government Accountability Office are against having another agency duplicate the FDA's efforts.

"Unless catfish have suddenly sprouted legs, USDA should stick to meat, poultry and egg inspections," McCain wrote.

Nearly $20 million has already been spent on the USDA's Office of Catfish Inspection since its creation in 2008. Its supporters say the FDA is woefully underfunded and ill-equipped to monitor imported seafood — especially when it comes to testing for residues of drugs used by foreign producers — and needs USDA's help.

Those supporters include, unsurprisingly, the Catfish Farmers of America, a trade group that has argued that foreign catfish are riskier for consumers than what we grow here. A report the group commissioned in 2010 found that salmonella, the pathogen most often associated with catfish, was found more frequently on imported catfish than on domestic catfish.

The FDA has indeed been regularly lambasted for not being able to keep up with testing of all imported seafood, not just catfish. The U.S. imports 90 percent of its seafood, but according to the Government Accountability Office, in 2009, the FDA performed drug residue testing on only 0.1 percent of the seafood coming into the country. (In its tests, the FDA is looking for residue showing both use of unapproved drugs and misuse of approved drugs.)

Consumers Union is also in favor of USDA getting involved with catfish inspection. In comments prepared for Congress back in 2011, CU senior scientist Michael Hansen wrote, "We believe that [USDA's Food Safety Inspection Service] is better suited than the FDA to ensure the safety of domestic and imported catfish, as FSIS does a more comprehensive review of food safety systems." In particular, Hansen wrote, his group was worried about foreign catfish producers' use of drugs unapproved for use in aquaculture in the U.S., which could affect consumers' health or contribute to antibiotic resistance.

And yet the GAO has agreed with Shaheen and McCain that the USDA catfish program won't add much to what the FDA is already doing. The GAO recommends that Congress instead help FDA do a better job inspecting seafood.

But The Hill reports that the amendment to kill the catfish office may not get a vote at all. Why? Agriculture Committee leaders are unlikely to allow it or other "non-controversial" amendments to be brought up before a vote on final passage of the farm bill. Over in the House, the Agriculture Committee has voted to repeal the inspection program, according to Food Safety News.

Copyright 2013 NPR.

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The Farm Bill: A Senate Catfight Over Catfish