You have to give credit where credit is due–to Indiana regulators who have just issued a report about possibly loosening the state’s strict prohibitions on raw milk.
But while they are refreshingly candid in identifying key problems in the debate over access to raw milk, they stick to the party line when it comes to offering approaches that might plow new ground in the tiresome and seemingly endless debate over whether the growing number of consumers demanding access to raw milk should have it. When they are done, they appear to reinforce the notion that Indiana’s existing system of private raw milk distribution is preferable to a highly restrictive “public” system of availability.
The Indiana Board of Animal Health was ordered by the legislature earlier this year to complete an assessment of raw milk, to help legislators to decide whether to officially legalize raw milk sales in some way. While officially illegal, the state doesn’t now interfere with private sales by farmers direct to consumers, nor with herd shares, food clubs, or sales of raw milk as pet food.
The agency took its mandate sort of seriously, creating an advisory committee including a few raw milk proponents among the majority from processor and university opponents. It made a show of effort to collect serious research on various reports and advisories. There are 19 appendices, including a press release from the Weston A. Price Foundation questioning the dire interpretation of data by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control on raw milk dangers. However, recent research out of Europe about the possible health benefits of raw milk is notably missing, and the appendices are weighted toward various government warnings about raw milk.
Perhaps most notable for government regulators, the agency created a report that for possibly the first time uttered two fundamental truths:
1. That “no consensus middle ground exists between the public health community that wants no raw milk sales to consumers and advocates who want raw milk sales to consumers.”
2. That as committed as the state BOAH is to pasteurization, “the decision to authorize or not the sale of unpasteurized milk to consumers is ultimately a political decision.”
Also to its credit, the agency tried to assess how dairy farmers might react to official sanctioning of raw milk. It acknowledged that not only is there substantial unfilled demand by consumers, but that there is a widespread desire by dairy farmers to sell raw milk. Of 242 farmers who responded to a BOAH survey on raw milk, “158 indicated they would sell raw milk to consumers if it was legalized in Indiana.” That is just about two-thirds of those responding.
In the end, though, the BOAH report pulled back from offering anything beyond a possible official easing of rules, whereby farmers would be granted permits to sell raw milk directly from the farm. They would be required to meet “sanitation standards” established by the BOAH.
In making that overture, though, the agency noted that an advisory committee consisting of both proponents and opponents of raw milk ran into a brick wall over the contentious matter of distribution.
“The committee was unable to reach a consensus on the location and manner of sales from the farmer to consumers. Some members of the committee were in favor of restricting sales and delivery at the farm where the product was produced only. Others members of the committee wanted sales and delivery from the farmer to the consumer at other locations” like at farmer stores, farmers markets, and delivery to consumers or to dropoff points.
The issue of delivery has been a big part of the problem in other states, most notably Minnesota. There, the state has taken farmers to court over their insistence on delivering milk to consumer drop sites.
The report made clear that if a permit system for farmers was adopted, then all raw milk producers, including those who produce for herd shares and buying clubs, would then fall under the new regulations, and have to conform to the same sanitation standards. It isn’t clear if consumers who now obtain raw milk via herd shares, private sales, and as pet food would lose delivery flexibility under a farmer permit system, though when dealing with regulators, it’s most realistic to assume the worst. Thus, a BOAH-regulated system could place a layer of possibly very tough regulation in place via farm-based sales that prohibit any kind of delivery.
Given the super-cautious BOAH approach, my guess is that this report will most likely wind up in the trash bin, similar to what occurred in Wisconsin last year after it convened a similar kind of regulator-inspired examination of raw milk sales. (That 261-page report was much more specific about the nature of sanitation and other regulations that would be part of any farmer permit system, and possibly sank in part because of the detail.)
This report will at least be remembered for having been honest enough to acknowledge that the hard decisions are political, not public-health-based, and that finding common ground won’t occur…unless forced by consumers and farmers.
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A Wisconsin judge put off a decision today (Monday) on a motion by the state’s Department of Agriculture, Trade and Consumer Protection (DATCP) for an injunction to permanently bar Arlin Bender from practicing his trade as a butcher (as described in my previous post).
Instead, the judge agreed to hear Bender’s motion, as presented by his new lawyer, Elizabeth Rich of the Farm-to-Consumer Legal Defense Fund, on modification of the temporary injunction. That hearing will be held at 11 a.m. on January 16, at which time the judge will consider Rich’s motion.
Another new wrinkle is that Bender will get a trial, on March 4-5. DATCAP’s motion for a permanent injunction will be heard immediately after the trial, at which point it could be moot if Bender is exonerated in the trial.
Nearly 30 people, nearly all members of Bender’s Mennonite community, attended today’s hearing.
This issue of legalization leading to increased regulation for all distribution channels highlights how the local food movement doesn’t want “legalization”, but decriminalization. (Not to mention how the former term and concept implies that the government has the right to criminalize anything it wants, and we should feel “allowed” to do only what elites explicitly say we’re allowed to do.)
Affirmative legalization with accompanying intensive regulatory oversight will as a rule be done under corporatist auspices. Decriminalization simply sets the people’s energy and innovation free.
It took over 30 years for TPTB to take notice of this guy speaking out against system. I guess I have been naive in regards to wisdom teeth. I assumed that they were left alone unless there was a problem. Why remove something that isn’t causing a problem? Oh yeah $$$$$, silly me.
Will the acknowledgement that it is “political” and not a public health based become buried and ignored?
Most people are not concerned with the safety of what they eat and are certainly not concerned with what others eat so why do we pretend to be concerned with the safety of raw milk? This is obviously politics and politics can not be allowed into a discussion of this magnitude. This is bigger than taxes or how much we make, it’s bigger than the Holocaust, bigger than Vietnam, bigger than the number of Russians killed in WWII, even bigger then the number of Chinese killed in WWII. We are talking about the murder of every man woman and child in the United States for the last one hundred years.
About the recipes, I’m a terrible cook but I have been known to collect a recipe or two. I believe good recipes are the perfect compliment to raw milk. Lets face it, we can’t drink milk all the time. And I do believe, we all need to supplement from time to time.
I just watched Farmageddon for the first time. And seeing the Farm-to-Consumer Legal Defense Fund (FTCLDF) kind of upset me. You know I emailed Pete Kennedy once, about incidental sales in Wisconsin and he kind of blew me off.
I haven’t yet seen Farmageddon, so I didn’t quite follow your comment about the FTCLDF and/or why it upset you. What’s that all about?
I haven’t heard more than two tweets about the Nestle Quik recall of late, but let it be Trader Joe’s or Whole Foods and the MSM is all over it. What we need isn’t more regulation, it’s enforcement of the regs we already have in place which apparently no one cares about until it’s front and center. The article gives some interesting stats though. People are getting tired of this recall stuff with boxed and frozen foods.
If you haven’t heard the term incidental sales this is it in a nutshell; the biggest problem in Wisconsin right now is that the state says direct farm sales of raw milk are prohibited even though the law states that incidental sales not in the regular course of business are allowed.
The state infers(though they have never actually said this was a definition) that this means one time sales, even though the legal definition is actually “separate business”. FTCLDF says Wisconsin’s prohibition could easily be contested but that they would prefer to change the law instead.
This makes no sense to me. I don’t know of any state that has a better raw milk law. The problem is the state refusing to fallow it.
http://www.farmtoconsumer.org/raw_milk_map.htm
Of course the only acceptable “law” is full decriminalization, as this system has proven its bad faith where it comes to any form of “regulation”, and an alien central government can’t legitimately or effectively regulate naturally local/regional food markets anyway. All it can do is impose a planned-economy food commodification regime from above and try to destroy all natural food markets.
What bothers me is seeing my fellow raw milk supporters arguing the wrong issues and supporting the wrong bills.
The state infers(though they have never actually said this was a definition) that this means one time sales, even though the legal definition is actually “separate business”. ”
The only problem with the Wisconsin law is that I don’t think it allows raw butter and cheese and the wording regarding the advertising of raw milk sales. And of course it doesn’t seem to allow raw milk in stores but selling it in a store is a whole different animal.
When I said “I don’t know of any state that has a better raw milk law.” I was referring to the actual law itself not the way the state administers it. Wisconsin law allows incidental sales of raw milk from the farm with no special testing or requirements of any kind. Is there any state that can beat that?
I guess the biggest misinterpretation among the people is this notion that there’s such a thing as “the law” mystically existing beyond a power structure’s administration of it. But the fact is that in reality there’s nothing but power, and the only question is whether power is naturally and rightfully decentralized among organic communities, or whether it’s usurped and concentrated up hierarchies which are alien to human communities. Any power concentration will extrude things like “laws” for its own benefit only. If we want better laws, we have to formulate and administer them ourselves, as communities. That in turn requires taking back our power by relocalizing it.
I tend to think some people are alarmists, but then again I only know what I read every day, so this could be a more serious issue than any of us understands. But no one is going to convince me that food isn’t healing, especially things like raw milk and good pastured eggs. Two of the best foods we’ve got going for us, for sure.
Of course the end of cheap oil will mean the end of all this. The only question is what we can do to build the new society in the meantime and defend it against the system’s assault. Whether or not we can do that, and to what extent, is purely a function of the will to do it, and the belief in it. It never takes many people, just a critical mass. But those who pre-emptively surrender, sheerly out of lack of imagination, or out of cowardice, have never accomplished anything, and have never been anything but slaves.
1. Relocalize food production and distribution along organic lines. (Organic in the true Albert Howard sense, what Salatin calls “beyond organic”, not just the threadbare credential-organic sense.) Close all economic and physical loops. The principles in rough order of importance: Local/seasonal, organic, in accord with nature, sustainable and democratic. Emphasize local/regional adaptation for every part of the system.
2. Farmers should break free of the industrial model and embrace the relocalization model. More and more smallish farmers who were going under trying to keep up in the commodified system found themselves much better off when they switched to the local food model. All real farmers should do this. It may be difficult, but it’s an adaptation and survival-of-the-fittest idea. Those who have the right ideas are certainly more “fit” than those who insist on remaining within a harsh environment when they could migrate to a much more favorable one. It’s the only thing that will work over the long run, and it’s the right thing to do. And communities can help.
3. People need to become citizens of food, as much as possible: Buy local and true organic, learn traditional preparation and preservation, grow their own food, form Community Food organizations, support local farmers and food hubs and similar businesses/groups in every way possible.
4. As part of this, citizens need to become educated about the corporate food system, its inherent evils, and how it assaults the rising Community Food movement. (To be clear, industrial ag and food relocalization are not two species of an overall “food sector”, but two completely different sectors. The primary goals of the latter are providing and enjoying healthy real food and rebuilding our communities. The primary goals of the former are power, profit, enclosure, domination.) Citizens need to reject the legitimacy, authority, prerogatives, and “rights” of anything to do with corporate food. We need to be present in the public consciousness as aggressive advocates, always getting the message out there, and always ready to fight any particular system assault. We need to build a movement, based on community organizations which form confederated networks, Committees of Correspondence.
5. Then, when the system does assault a particular farmer or other participant, in addition to the resistance of those personally involved as friends and customers, there will be a whole confederated framework ready to assist according to an established template.
These are the things I’ve devoted myself to doing. I’m making my first attempt at retail farming this coming year, and simultaneous with that I’ll continue my work with local sustainability groups, including trying to infuse more of the emphasis I outlined here. So that’s what I’m doing, and that’s what I recommend others do. Then each citizen does as much as they can toward these goals. It won’t be done overnight, and it’ll be a lot of work, with considerable risk, but unless we want to perish, it has to be done.
Similar things can be done where it comes to all other sectors, and the confederation eventually can embrace all sectors.
I still think some good reporter with the authority to dig should be looking into (and reporting it all over the place) what guys like Sheehan and Mike Taylor are eating on a daily basis. You can bet dollars to donuts it’s not the stuff off the Safeway grocery store shelves.
My description of the necessary movement and what it has to do is perfectly clear. It just sounds too hard and dangerous to you. Of course not doing it will, in the long run, be the much harder and much more dangerous path.
“Bypassing” the law is exactly what I said – enough people passively and/or actively refusing to recognize, refusing to obey, refusing to cooperate, acting in defiance, as human beings.