Food: Made in the U.S.A.

In the late 1990s, Florida farmers sent an undercover video crew to Mexico to document sanitary and pesticide violations and child labor. The expose became known on Capitol Hill as the "Mexican death tape." But today several activists have grown quieter, charging that grocery chains are retaliating by canceling orders. "The markup is so outrageous, they don't want anyone messing with it," says a tomato grower. Luis Rodriguez, a consultant for Florida Farmers Inc., an advocacy group, says he listened in on a conversation in which a Wal-Mart official told a supplier that he planned to stop buying from farmers promoting mandatory labeling. Says Rodriguez: "These guys are scared." A Wal-Mart representative denied any intimidation.

Passions in the fish industry run just as high. Imported shrimp, much of it farmed in Thailand and China, has bankrupted fishermen along the U.S. Gulf Coast. Alaska fishermen, who catch only wild salmon at sea (fish farms are prohibited in the state), are being hammered by farm-raised salmon from Chile and Canada. "In 1988 I got $1 a pound for pink salmon. Now I get 7¢," says Scott McAllister, steering his boat past Alaska's Glacier Bay. He believes labels will help. "[People] will think it's cool to buy Alaska salmon from a wild and grizzly guy out here," he says. "And they will pay more for something healthy." Under the new rules, seafood must be labeled FARMED or WILD. Scientists say farmed seafood is often contaminated with dioxin, PCBs and other dangerous chemicals.

In the end, the labeling battle is not just about power and money but about identity. To be sure, billions of dollars are at stake. And U.S. producers might capture a bigger share of the dollar that now goes to processors and retailers. But will customers care whether beef is born and raised in Canada or California? Whether tomatoes hail from Mexico or Florida? Whether salmon is Alaskan or Chilean? No one is certain. Nonetheless, rancher Darrell Wood, farmer Chuck Obern and fisherman Scott McAllister are counting on it.