A new food-safety bill passed by Congress in December was expected to be signed into law on Tuesday. The new law will make big farms and food processors strengthen food safety plans.  Sen. Bernie Sanders responded to concerns by Vermont farmers and added a provision exempting small, low-risk, on-farm food processors from the new regulations. "While this legislation gives the FDA new tools to protect American families from contaminated foods, we avoided placing unnecessary requirements on small farms in Vermont and elsewhere," said Sanders, a member of the Senate health committee.

"We struck the right balance between the viability of small family farms that process foods and the safety of the nation's food supply," Sanders added.

Sanders' provision applies to farms that process their own products or combine products from several farms.  It gives the FDA authority to either exempt farms engaged in low-risk processing from new regulatory requirements or to modify particular regulatory requirements for such farming operations.  Existing FDA regulations already exempt farms that market a majority of products directly to consumers.  Family-scale producers would, however, continue to be overseen by local and state food safety and health agencies.

Sanders also supported a provision written by Sen. Jon Tester which exempts food producers who sell more than half of their goods directly to consumers, have less than $500,000 in annual sales, and comply with existing state and local requirements.

"Today, one out of six Americans gets sick from foodborne illness each year with 128,000 people ending up in the hospital and 3,000 people dying every year," Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius told reporters Monday.