The Vineyard is generally a safe place to eat. You can visit the fields where your vegetables were grown, you know the roast chicken you’re having for dinner was slaughtered humanely at an Island farm and this is a small enough community where you trust the purveyors.

But not everything Islanders eat is local, and when there’s a baby spinach recall, as there was in 2010, a tomato salmonella scare, as there was in 2008, or a hot dog recall like the one in 1999, questions arise over how safe we really are from foodborne illnesses.

The new Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Food Safety Modernization Act aims to make sure the food on your plate is safer than ever. Signed into law earlier this month, the food safety bill redirects the direction of the FDA. Instead of dealing with foodborne illnesses after the outbreak occurs, the agency will focus on prevention.

The bill gives the FDA authority to directly issue food recalls instead of asking the manufacturers to do so voluntarily, oversee food production in foreign countries that is imported into the United States, and establishes science-based standards for the safety of fresh produce.

But when it comes to the call for more frequent inspections at food facilities and for those facilities to come up with a written plan for how to prevent safety issues, small Island farms (and farms of similar size across the country) have been given some relief.

“The farmers need to know for them at the scale we’re farming on the Vineyard this isn’t going to necessarily impact them, so it’s really about communication and knowing this is a move, from all indications, that people are looking at scalable, size-appropriate regulations which is a huge move,” said Ali Berlow, former director of Island Grown Initiative, last week. “That one size fits all — this is a big a chink in that armor, so to speak,” she added.

Small sustainable agriculture groups fought tirelessly to have the Tester-Hagan amendment added into the final version of the bill; the amendment exempts farms which make less than $500,000 a year (adjusted for inflation) from filing permits and paperwork with the FDA. Sponsored by Democratic Sens. Kay Hagan of North Carolina and Jon Tester of Montana, the amendment makes food safety farmer friendly.

“The Tester-Hagan amendment isn’t necessarily an exemption, but it allows farmers to adopt alternative food safety regimens that are required at a state and local level,” said Annette Higby, grass-roots advocacy and outreach coordinator for the National Sustainable Agricultural Coalition in a recent telephone interview.

She continued: “The first thing [farmers] need to do is comply with existing regulations, and there are plenty right now on a state and local level. If they’re complying with that and can show the FDA they’re in compliance, that should be all they need to do.”

There are a few ways farms can meet the exemption. Farms growing fruits and vegetables with gross sales under $500,000 who sell more than half their products directly to consumers, restaurants or retailers are not required to register with the FDA. They are required to display their farm label and address when selling.

The amendment also clarifies that farmers’ markets, roadside stands and Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) cooperatives such as Whippoorwill Farm and the Farm Institute are included in the definition of retail food establishments, which means they are included in the exemption.

Businesses that sell exclusively to individual consumers and sell more than half their product are also exempt from registering with the FDA.

Farms that sell food directly to individual consumers but sell less than half of their products can present paperwork to qualify for the exemption by showing they comply with local and state safety laws. This will exempt them from the federal regulations, but the farm must register with the FDA.

There are no records of a foodborne illness outbreak on the Island, but if one did occur and the product is traced to a farm covered by the amendment, the FDA can revoke the Tester-Hagan rules and impose stricter regulations.

“We were trying to tell the FDA there is no unsafe food you need to focus on processing,” Ms. Higby said. “We wanted them to take a rational and risk-based approach and focus on those areas with most risk as opposed to being on every farm to make sure every jar of jam or jelly was safe. It’s not the crop that’s dangerous, it’s the way in which processing is handled and how long it takes from process [to the table].”

One provision in the amendment includes a study on the safety of local food — is it really safer than food from a large company? “We found that there wasn’t a lot of data available so we suggested do a study,” Ms. Higby explained.

“It was really clear the industrialized food process was broken and consumers were not safe and something needed to happen and it needed to happen so that it wouldn’t put small and mid-sized farmers out of market,” she said. “It was really a negotiating process between the sustainable agriculture community and consumer organizations. Of course the big agriculture folks were unhappy carving out special regulatory provisions for small farmers. But that’s how they win, they knock small and midsize [farms] off the radar screen.”

Overall, Ms. Higby said her organization was happy with the middle road taken and considers it a huge victory for sustainable agriculture. But it’s not over until the new regulations are put in place, and that requires funding. The Congressional Budget Office estimates the food safety bill would cost $1.4 billion in its first five years, and calls for hiring an additional 2,000 food inspectors.

Ms. Higby said now a new fight begins. The coalition is currently working on funding for an amendment sponsored by Michigan Sen. Debbie Stabenow to provide competitive grants for food safety training for small farmers.

“We’re hoping [funding for the grants] can come on line as quickly as possible so farmers on the Vineyard or elsewhere are able to get the training they need to put in place for steps to insure food safety,” she sad.